Crash Course 2: Perfect
by Lilith Demodae
Summary: Crash has the perfect home, the perfect husband, the perfect life. Too bad none of them are really hers.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **This story actually came to me _after_ I'd started writing what has become the third story in this saga.

* * *

Crash Course 2: Perfect

_My life is perfect. There really is no other way to phrase it. I know it sounds trite, perhaps even cliche, but that does not make it any less true. After all, cliches become that way when overuse is taken to its extreme. Extreme situations require extreme terms, possibly even extreme cliches. So it is with my life. Besides, understatement only works when someone realizes that you are not pushing things nearly as far as you can, and I've never much cared for it anyway._

_My home is supremely beautiful. An entire floor in the Lorrus tower is given over to our quarters. The rooms are spacious, open and airy, looking out over wonderful vistas of the sprawling city. Situated well above the traffic lanes, we are ensured that the rushing streams of vehicles will not mar the scenery or intrude with unwanted noise. Every furnishing has been chosen for aesthetics as well as function, each matched to the others in a common theme of modest conspicuous consumption. After all, what good is money if you don't spend it making life easier or more comfortable for yourself? We have all the best appliances and conveniences, droids and assistants. Luring our cook away from Senator Denali wasn't easy, but was oh so very worth every incentive required to manage that feat._

_The entire floor just below our quarters is my garden. A piece of historical and botanical preservation I can't help but be proud of, it is made up entirely of plant species native to Coruscant, some of which have come to the very edge of extinction and are kept from that fate by my garden and others like it. Flagstone paths wind throughout, and enticing conversation niches of small glades carpeted in soft grass open here and there at comfortable intervals. There's been many a lovely dinner party hosted there and I can only praise my landscaper in the most lavish terms._

_My responsibilities are light, or at least they have been since... and they prove sufficient to keep me from boredom. Besides keeping the household running smoothly, I usually arrange my husband's social schedule, making sure that he meets with everyone who needs his time and whose time he needs. I'm good at it, which only follows I suppose. After all, I used to be his secretary and a household is so much easier to run than a multibillion credit company._

_And finally there's my husband of seven years. Eseladai Tolwyn, president and CEO of Xanthus Corp., is everything I could possibly have wished for and more. At one point eight meters (5'10") he is fit and trim, with not a spare gram of flesh on his body. Lean and handsome, his cheekbones are high and his nose aquiline, aristocratic even. I love running my fingers through the short, tight curls of his hair, as carbon black as my own. He owns my heart, lock, stock, and crate. I have never doubted his devotion to me, his soul-deep love, and I never will._

_I know very well that there are people out there who will never experience such good fortune as I have found. I used to be one of them, even joined a swoop gang very briefly, but I fought my way free of the streets, determined to climb as high above them as I could. _

_Dai has done much the same, though he made it much farther than I before he stopped. He lifted me higher than I could ever have dreamed I would go. For me there are no more worries about enough food at the end of the month, enough credits for rent at the beginning of the month, enough time in the day, enough sleep at night. No, the days of scrabbling for every decicred are over forever, and I only look back long enough to remind myself of how much better my life has become since I met Dai. Instead of an endless progression of drudgery and despair eking out a bleak and bare existence, my days pass in a slow parade of simple pleasures, punctuated with social events, and frosted by the companionship and enduring love of Dai._

_So you see, my life is perfect. Perfect house, perfect job, perfect marriage._

_And yet..._

* * *

Sunlight slanted across my face, warming my skin and brightening the place behind my eyelids to a rosy glow. I stretched, the silk sheets slithering across my skin in a hedonistic caress. Smiling, I ran clawed fingers through my hair, scrubbing at my scalp, and luxuriated in the sensations. I drew deep breaths of the fresh air coming through the open balcony door, savoring each wonderful lungful. Glorious, just living and breathing at that moment and taking it all in was glorious. There was something about mornings, whether the sense of newness, or perhaps the feeling that the whole world pauses for just a moment to catch its breath before plunging forward once more. Morning had to be my favorite part of the day.

Turning my face into the sunshine, I reached out with my left hand. The other side of the bed was long empty, the body heat dissipated. My husband was an early riser, gone to work before the sun ever got high enough to shine down on our bed. The Force only knew why I might have expected him to be there, since there had been no sound or motion that might draw my attention.

With a small sigh, I opened my eyes and stared up at the ceiling. The textured pattern under the paint led my wandering gaze here and there as I thought of nothing much at all. Sunlight glimmered and danced at the corner of my eye, reminding me that the day spun on, whether I got my lazy carcass moving or not. Finally, I pushed myself up and swung my legs off the side of the bed. Twitching the sheets into a more conventional arrangement, I straightened things a little then padded across to the refresher. I paused at the window, pressing one hand against the cool transparisteel. The city was spread out beneath me in a glittering grey and white panorama. Sunlight clung to the eastern faces of buildings, running down and disappearing toward the ground, like a giant bucket of honey splashed across the world. My gaze was caught in the distance by the layered courses of the traffic lanes, the arteries of the vast city, carrying its lifeblood of commerce to every far flung limb. Something about the moving vehicles riveted my attention and made me uneasy. I stared hard at them, trying to find the source of my anxiety, but I could detect nothing amiss.

Pulling away from the view, I continued on, dragging my sleepshirt off over my head and dismissing the strange feeling as nothing more than the remnants of an already forgotten dream. As I stepped into the refresher, I dropped the shirt in a corner for the droid to collect for cleaning. The slightly cool spray of the shower helped me wash away the last lingering bits of sleep.

Wrapped in a warm robe, my hair bound up in a gleaming white towel, I went back into the room and crossed to the vanity. PC-46 was already waiting for me with my breakfast. The droid whisked the damp towel away from my hair even as I seated myself, and proceeded to comb and dry the thick, black mass.

"What's my schedule today, Foursix?" I asked before selecting a thin wedge of toasted black bread spread with pale green shi'rz preserves.

"Master Malos has asked to review the plans for the dinner party with you over lunch so that he can arrange proper security and get the menu sent to the caterers, mistress Tolwyn," the droid responded instantly in a soft alto voice.

"No, no, no." I sighed, dabbing away crumbs from my lips with a snowy napkin. "He knows very well I have luncheon with Vrenna Rhysode today. I won't have him interrupting and I certainly won't have him looming. He's been with us a long time, and I know he worries about me, but having him solicitously by my side the entire meal will make me look scared, weak, or in need of looking after, and that's not the impression I want to give that gossip monger. He can talk to me before, or after, but not_ during_ lunch. Besides, that party's not for another three days and Dai hasn't even finished the guest list yet." I chewed my lip for a moment as I thought. "Tell Thackary not to worry about the caterers, that's my job and I certainly don't need his help at this late date. I'll com Dai and see if I can't nail down some sort of tentative list so he can at least begin planning the security end of things though."

"Yes, mistress Tolwyn."

"Did Dai mention when he expected to be home tonight?"

"Master Tolwyn said he had a board meeting immediately after lunch, but that he did not expect it to last long. He said he would probably be home early today."

"Excellent." With a contented sigh, I leaned back into my chair and relaxed while the droid finished its work.

* * *

Hair primped and curled, nails lacquered, make-up applied with the deft touch that only a superbly programmed droid could achieve, and dressed in a light pants suit of cream colored silk and a linen blouse of light grey-green, I moved into my husband's home office. Foursix had gone off to relay my messages to our head of security, so I needed to go about my end of the deal. My spike heels sank a full centimeter into the plush grey carpeting as I crossed to the old-fashioned real wood desk. Pulling the chair away from the computer terminal, I sat at the corner in front of the communit and dialed up my husband's work number.

"Xanthus, Mr. Tolwyn's office."

"Jonica, is Dai busy?"

"No, Mrs. Tolwyn. I'll put you right through." The grey-skinned near-human disappeared from the screen almost as fast as she had appeared and my husband's lean, handsome visage replaced hers.

"Darling." Those deep blue eyes scanned my face quickly, worry tightening his features. "Are you feeling all right? What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, nothing at all. As the doctors and I have been telling you all along, I'll be fine."

Lips set in a rueful twist, he sighed. "As long as you are okay, I can handle anything else. What can I do for you?"

"The dinner party, Dai. Thackary needs that guest list. You know how he gets if he can't sort out every last detail at least a day in advance."

"He bothering you again?" I nodded and blue eyes sparkled at me as Dai grinned, a wonderful sight that blunted the sometimes harsh lines of his face. "Yes, I know exactly how he gets. Tell you what, I promise I'll write up a list and send it over by eleven. You can look it over and see if I've missed anyone. Does that work for you?"

"Perfectly. Thank you, love."

"I'll see you when I get home."

I blew him a kiss and cut the connection. Standing, I put the chair back in front of the computer and then I stood there, staring at the machine a moment. I've never gotten along well with computers, just well enough to get my work done and no more, and yet they held a strange fascination for me. I often itched to play around, to see if I could learn a little more, but I was also terribly afraid of making some horrible mistake and ruining something important of Dai's. That fear had always overwhelmed any exploratory longings, and no doubt always would. Giving the computer a last confused frown, I left the office and moved on with my day.

* * *

"He leaned over the table to kiss me and managed to smear the gravy from his steak all down his front," I told Vrenna, pushing the remains of a light salad around my plate with a fork, eyes on the past. "A bright blue stain from here to here. I couldn't help it. I burst right out laughing. The man had just proposed to me and I laughed in his face. He sat down so fast that the edge of the plate caught under a button and tipped the rest of it smack into his lap. I rushed over to help him clean it up, as did the two nearest waiter droids, and he started laughing too. So, when I finally said yes and accepted the ring, it was me on my knees next to him, instead of the other way around."

My face warmed, my whole being lighting up with the memory, as Vrenna chirped out a pinched excuse for a laugh. She had demolished two full plates of salad and was working on her third glass of Clerif White, while what was left of my first glass slowly warmed in the simulated sun between polite sips.

"My dear, that is a wonderful story. My own acceptance to matrimony was nowhere near as entertaining. My poor husband made it sound more like a business merger than romance. I fear the man has no imagination in his soul."

I nodded, a polite, if strained smile pasted on my lips. The luncheon was going into its second hour, the headache pressing at my temples throbbed slowly, threatening serious escalation, and Mrs. Rhysode showed not the least inclination to leave. The conversation lapsed, and I sat back as Foursix moved in on my covert gesture under the table and began to clear away the dishes. I glanced away from my guest to the moon lilies that graced the nearest decorative pond and poured soft perfume into the air. I closed my eyes briefly, listening to the gentle sounds around me. There were no birds in my garden, no small living things to add vital sound, but that did not bother me. I found the near absolute silence soothing. Only the rustling leaves and the domestic sounds of Foursix disturbed the peace.

Oh, and my lunch companion.

Vrenna Rhysode was anything but soothing or peaceful. Her prying curiosity grated, and then there was the way she leaned forward to search my words for any scrap or tidbit of information that could be used for her or against us. She disgusted me and I wished this whole thing over and done with, but it had been my idea. Dai argued that I wasn't strong enough yet, but I knew I was. This was the best way to prove it and with the dinner party in just three more days, this was the closest to a trial run as I was going to get.

"Well, I must say that you and Eseladai seem to be doing well."

"We're doing quite well, as a matter of fact. Xanthus is turning better profits than expected for the sixth quarter in a row. Dai is a shrewd business man."

"Never in doubt, my dear. Never in doubt." Her blue lacquered nails rattled against the glass tabletop and her black eyes scanned my face yet again. I didn't like those eyes. They glinted, but flatly, like a Rancor's, and felt just as hungry. "Actually, your husband wasn't ever really the issue. It was you we were intrigued by."

"Dai is a very private person, Mrs. Rhysode. We were married in a family-only ceremony on Lyra, his home planet, and I stayed there. He would come back and visit me whenever business allowed, but he didn't really want me coming back to Coruscant and being subjected, to put it bluntly, to the very scrutiny I've been under since I arrived a month ago."

Not the information she was digging for, but I'd have chewed my own tongue before I gave her the satisfaction of sating her curiosity. I was well, the doctors all said it was over, so there was no point in dragging the morbid details out for everyone to sift through at their leisure. I'd either picked the exactly the right, or exactly the wrong person for this first 'public' appearance. She'd spread the word that all was right in the Tolwyn household to the length and breadth of Coruscant before nightfall if I didn't have her killed the second she crossed the threshold on her way out.

"Yes, dear, but-"

Coming to a snap decision, I cut her off, glancing sharply at my chrono. "Oh dear. I'm truly sorry, Vrenna, but I have a busy schedule. I'm already running quite late. If you'll excuse me, Foursix will show you out when you're ready."

I pushed away from the table and walked across the grass, the green stems with their delicate looking purple veins hissing softly under my feet. Vrenna Rhysode disappeared from view gratifyingly quickly and Thackary intercepted me well short of the turbolift.

"She'll be out before you reach the office."

"No, Thackary, don't be rude. Just keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn't badger poor Foursix into letting her stay any longer." The turbolift doors closed over us, shutting out the garden and the horrible woman who occupied it, and I took the opportunity to rub at my temples.

"Mrs. Tolwyn-"

"No, I'm all right." I waved him away and straightened my posture. "That woman would try the patience of a Jedi Knight."

"Never in doubt, Mrs. Tolwyn. Never in doubt."

I rewarded him with a small laugh and a wry smile for his cleverness at mimicking her fawning tone so closely.

"Thank you, Thackary, I needed that."

His own grin faded and he glanced me over from head to toe. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"Perfectly fine. In fact, I'm going to call the caterers just so that I'm not a complete liar."

"Yes, ma'am."

I stepped out of the turbolift and strode toward the office, leaving Thackary behind me to return to his unobtrusive men in the garden below. First that call, and then perhaps a small nap. Lunch, and Vrenna, had managed to leech away all the wonderful energy I'd started the morning with.

* * *

Strange voices, muffled and distorted, though by what I couldn't tell. Fear prickled my skin and made my heart race. I knew I was in danger, but the source was elusive, slipping out of my mental grasp before I could pin it down. Why wouldn't my arms move? Was I restrained? Some small and indistinct message from my inner ear whispered that I was reclining, perhaps even laying flat on my back. What was going on? Two voices, one firm and concerned, almost passionate, and the other clinical, neutral, spoke in a conversation all out of context.

"She won't remember?"

"A little disorientation is normal, perhaps vague nightmares once in a while, but with this sort of treatment ... no, she shouldn't remember a thing."

"But she'll be healthy, and her mind will function properly?"

"Oh yes, her mind will function perfectly. As indicated, it is only the more recent memories that might cause problems."

"Then do what you are being paid for, doctor."

My own moan of fear startled me awake, and I thrashed upright, fighting my way free of the entangling sheets. I stared around me and, for a moment, the walls were stark grey industrial permacrete instead of the cool beige they should have been. I was certain that if I swung my feet to the grey carpeting I would find it hard and cold. A strange hollow echoing bounced around me, rocking me back against the headboard, and then the door slammed aside at emergency override speed, and Thackary rushed in, blaster half drawn. The spell, whatever it had been, was broken and my bedroom returned to normal.

"Mrs. Tolwyn, are you okay?" His eyes were less on me and more on the rest of the room, gaze darting here and there, searching for unseen enemies.

Still clutching the sheets up around my throat, I twitched out an affirmative nod. "Yes, it was just a dream. I will be fine in a moment."

His stormy blue-steel eyes peered hard at me, testing for veracity, and I assumed finding it. He reholstered the weapon beneath his dark tunic jacket, and raked a searching glance around the bedroom once more.

"I'll call Mr. Tolwyn then."

"Oh no, please don't, Thackary. It was just a dream." Reaching out with one hand as if to restrain him, I clutched the silk of the sheets closer still. "I can barely remember a thing about it already. There's no need to disturb him, especially not if he's in a board meeting."

"I have my orders, ma'am."

"Please, Thackary. I've worked so hard to come back. Please don't take it away from me now. Dai will overreact and hustle me off to a clinic for my own sake, without thinking about whether or not that's the best thing for me. Please don't call him."

He hesitated still staring hard at me and I knew that I had won my case. Finally he tipped his head in acquiescence. "I won't comm him if you promise to tell him when he gets home."

"I will, I promise."

Lips set in a thin, grim line, my security chief bowed himself out of the room. Before the door had completely closed, I called after him softly.

"Thackary."

"Ma'am?"

"Thank you."

"Yes, ma'am."

* * *

When Dai finally came home I was propped up in our bed, reading, or at least pretending to read. More accurately, I was thinking of the best way to keep my promise to Thackary without alarming my husband. The door opened, much more sedately than the last time, and I set the datapad aside.

"I'm sorry I'm late, darling. There was the most horrendous snarl in traffic and I ran right into the back up. I don't understand how these things happen. I was in sight of the building, but just couldn't get here."

He walked to the closet and carefully hung up his tunic. Coming back, he perched on the bed next to me and loosened the collar of his shirt before leaning over to kiss me. I leaned into his touch, more grateful for the physical comfort it imparted than I could express with words, all thoughts of traffic patterns and poorly routed commercial vehicles evaporating from my mind.

"Mmmm," I hummed approvingly when he at last pulled away.

"And how was lunch today?"

Flouncing back into my pillows as best I could, I crossed my arms over my chest and pouted for all I was worth. "The woman is, is..." I waved my clawed hands in squashing motions towards each other. "She is a complete and utter..."

"Cretin," Dai supplied, a smile lurking far too near the surface to hide properly. "A prying, vicious, self-important busybody."

I thanked him with another kiss, though this one didn't last as long, to my dismay. "Not the exact words I was looking for, but they get the concept across well enough."

His hand trailed down the side of my face, over my shoulder, and down the length of my arm. Giving my hand a gentle squeeze, he shook his head at me. "Darling, I hate to say it, but-"

"Yes, you told me so. I know. But it really was good practice for our dinner party." His eyes scanned me restlessly, as they had since he'd walked through the door. I knew he wanted to protect me, to shelter me, but that was no way to live. I couldn't hide in these rooms, lovely though they were, for the rest of my life. "It will all be perfect. You'll see."

Those deep blue eyes flickered over my face once more. "Very well. You're in bed already, a bit tired?"

"A little. I took a small nap after lunch. I think I scared poor Thackary, though."

Dai had moved back to the closet. Bent over to unfasten a shoe, he watched me out of the corner of his eye. "Oh?"

"Yes, I had a bit of a nightmare and he burst into the room like a Republic Security commando unit. He scared me more than the silly dream did." I waved it away with airy motions, but Dai's gaze narrowed.

"What kind of dream?"

"Just flashbacks from the treatment, love. Nothing to worry about. It was most likely caused by the ever so curious Vrenna Rhysode."

Dai nodded solemnly and finished his task. He stripped out of his shirt, and clad only in his suit pants, he returned to me, taking up both my hands in his. His face was a study in concern, his brows drawn together, his lips slightly compressed.

"Darling, you _will_ tell me if you start feeling ... unlike yourself, won't you? I don't want you to relapse, if that's possible. You are the center of my life, I couldn't handle anything happening to you now, not after all we've gone through just to get this far. Promise me you won't push yourself too hard. Promise me you'll let me help you, take care of you. You've always been there for me, and now it's my turn to be there for you."

His right hand lifted to my cheek, his thumb lightly stroking my lower lip. I couldn't break away from his eyes, so full of emotion. Drowning in those eyes, I brought my hand up to cover his and nodded. "I promise. I love you, Dai."

"And I love you with all my heart, Chenowyth."


	2. Chapter 2

**Crash Course 2: Perfect -- Chapter 2**

* * *

Concerns about my health or strength notwithstanding, it wasn't difficult to convince Dai to make love to me that night. Then again, it never has been. And still, in the morning, again I reached out a hand to find him and again he wasn't there.

My fingers brushed the smooth silk, but the rumpled sheets were cool, no trace at all left of his body heat. There was only the faint scent of him clinging to the pillow and a memory of warm arms and quiet breathing. A horrible depression washed over me at his absence. My eyes squeezed shut and tears threatened, but in the strangely calm wake that followed the sudden wave I wondered at it. What was wrong with me that I needed Dai to be there when I woke? He was a busy and important man, he had things to do. My husband didn't have room on his schedule for laying around in bed waiting for me to wake up and smile at him in happily wedded bliss.

Frustrated, confused, and a little angry, I threw back the covers and stalked to the window, impatiently dragging my hair out of my eyes. Below the level of the window, the traffic swirled and streamed, the sun gleaming off dozens of different shades of hyperpaint like so many corusca gems. There was nothing disturbing about it that morning, nothing that made me uneasy. The even ebb and flow of it was soothing even, pulling my eyes this way and that as my spinning mind slowed and my emotions calmed. A darting shape caught my eye and I nearly forgot to sneer when I recognized the motion of a swoop dodging the saner vehicles. Leaning my forehead against the transparisteel, I let the vehicular currents pull him away from view, other thoughts on my mind.

There was nothing 'wrong' with me, I was just out of sorts. After all, no woman likes to wake up alone after an evening like I'd just enjoyed. I loved my husband, desired his company, and there's nothing more natural than that. That's all there was to it, nothing sinister or unbalanced, just perfectly reasonable longings for companionship. The obvious solution, of course, was to start waking up when he did so I could see him in the morning.

Smiling now, I moved to the refresher and really began my day.

* * *

"Someone to see you, mistress Tolwyn."

"Thank you, Foursix, I'll be right there."

Walking into the foyer the visitor was hard to miss. She wore the half worried look of someone afraid they are about to be tossed out on their backside at any moment, and she bore a covered dish of some sort. Of medium height for a woman, she nearly towered over me but still managed to look heartily intimidated when I entered the room.

"What can I do for you ..." I trailed off, hoping for a name to give this poor lost soul.

"Hué, Hué Jotlipan," she supplied, glancing down at her feet in a classic proclamation of near terminal shyness. That this woman had managed to press the summons chime amazed me no end. Of course, I'd been back on Coruscant for nearly a month now, and everyone in the building had known for at least the last ten days. I could only guess how many times she might have approached the door only to back out at the last minute. Proffering the covered dish she quickly continued, no doubt lest what bravery had brought her to my home flee before she was finished. "My husband and I live down on the fifty-third. I heard that you'd been ill and I thought maybe some home cooking might cheer you up a little."

We both glanced at her comfortably rounded figure and she blushed a bit. "I know good food always makes _me_ feel better."

She was so plainly sincere that I found myself smiling in response without any effort at all. Unlike my previous visitor, there was a very good chance of becoming friends with this woman, the Force knew I liked her better than Vrenna Rhysode after barely thirty seconds.

"Please, come in and sit down, Mrs. Jotlipan. It's so nice to finally meet some of our neighbors."

"Oh, please, call me Hué."

"And I'm Chenowyth."

"So pleased to meet you."

She tried to offer me her hand, and bobbled the dish, mortification wiping her face clear of other emotions. Stepping forward quickly, I took it from her and passed it to Foursix, who was waiting unobtrusively behind my left shoulder. Hands suddenly free, she tucked a short strand of soft brown hair behind one ear before deciding to give me another chance at a greeting. I shook her hand while the droid disappeared as silently as it had come.

"Come, let's sit and talk a bit." Laughing to try and get the woman to relax, I led her away from the foyer to the living room. As we walked she stared about us in unabashed ... I wouldn't have called it awe, but there was definitely respect and perhaps a little envy. Evidently more than ten floors made quite a difference indeed.

"You have a very lovely home, Mrs. T–Chenowyth."

Seating myself on a couch with one leg tucked up under me, I smiled. "Thank you, but I had nothing to do with it. It was either Dai or someone he hired. This last week has been the first I've actually set foot in this apartment, before that I was in a clinic."

"Oh." Settling gingerly on the edge of the love seat opposite me, as if afraid to disturb the calculated perfection of the surroundings, she gave me a furtive but searching glance. "I must say, you look quite healthy."

"Thank you. I hope you don't mind, but I don't like to talk about it much."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to-"

I held up a hand to wave this away before she'd even finished. Yes, I imagined Hué spent a good deal of time working up the courage to actually knock on my door. "Don't worry, you haven't offended me. I'm just ... tired of talking about it. It's all anyone seems to want to discuss."

"Ugh, I can imagine." She paused, then added, "Children are different, aren't they? They ask a few questions, then they accept things, and start talking about something else. I see it a lot in therapy."

Pleased, though I'd had little to do with the subject change, I watched her blossom and relax. "Your children are in therapy?"

The change in Hué's expression was so radical as to be shocking, but in a positive way. She seemed to sit up straighter, and her voice completely lost its hesitancy, became more confident. It sounded as professional and competent as … Dai's. "My own children aren't, no, but I work with children who need physical therapy. Most of them have sensory perception disorders – they have little to no sense of their own bodies. They have to be trained to literally feel themselves, know where they are, know where their bodies end and the rest of the universe begins. Many of the kids have problems with great or fine motor control, and lack of coordination or balance."

Hué stopped and smiled fondly. "They come from so many different backgrounds, yet they're all still just kids, and most of them just love to talk. It's different than being with adults; there's no trying to glean information, or showing how superior they are. The kids will just suddenly start telling me about their favorite toys and what they like to do, often it's the places they've been, or the places they'd like to visit, perhaps a new game they're playing. Sometimes you get very intelligent children there, who are hyperfocused on one thing. I know this young girl who's eagerly following every debate in the Galactic Senate. I get a little run-down on it once a week when she comes – I don't even have to watch the news anymore."

Leaning forward, I listened eagerly. "Go on, it sounds fascinating."

"Well." The glow on her face told me we'd hit on a favored topic, the contentment and enthusiasm lighting her splendid green eyes. It was nice to listen to someone who enjoyed what they did. "I love working with them. It takes time, of course – years – but you can look back after as few as six or eight months, and see how much progress you've made, and how much they've been able to learn. A lot of people think it's boring, that you'd be doing the same old exercises day in and day out, but it's not like that at all. Every child is different and needs different exercises. I try to offer variety, too, and make it all fun, or as fun as it can be. I don't think I do the same exercises more than once a day, sometimes not even that. But I wouldn't mind doing it even if it were that way, because the children themselves are fascinating. Their zest for life, their innocence, their brutal honesty is so refreshing and so wonderful to see."

My heart throbbed dully, a familiar pang taking up residence there. Children. Dai and I didn't have any. "When the time is right," he would often tell me, but so far the time had never been right. And I wanted children. Oh, how I wanted children. A little girl, or a little boy, I didn't care which, to love and cherish and teach. Watching a child grow into an intelligent and responsible adult must be the most rewarding thing in all the world.

I didn't realize I had spoken my thoughts aloud until Hué responded to them.

"Oh yes. It's a miracle everyday, seeing them getting the proper use of their bodies and the joy in their eyes. It just radiates out from them. You can actually feel it. But listen to me, I've been rambling on without stop. What is it that you do, Chenowyth?"

"Nothing so fulfilling as that, I'm afraid. Mostly I act as my husband's personal secretary. Come to think of it, if you hadn't stopped by I'd have been wandering around looking for something to keep me busy."

"That's the hardest part of the recuperative process, isn't it? You're no longer sick and tired, but you're just not quite ready to get back to the daily routine yet, either. One day, though, you'll just wake up and decide that it's time to go back to the work or hobbies you did before. I'm sure it won't take much longer with you." Hué smiled encouragingly.

"Most likely. I actually spent a lot of time yesterday finishing up the preparations for a dinner party, but now that it's all taken care of I haven't a lot to occupy me." A thought struck me and I beamed at her. "You wouldn't like to come to that, would you? It would be ever so comforting to have someone there that I already know."

Hué looked surprised and I could literally see how her "professional" façade crumbled to let her natural shyness through. "Uh, that's very nice of you. When is it?"

"Night after tomorrow. Eight sharp."

Her face fell with genuine regret. "Oh, I'm sorry, but Zahua and I are already busy that night."

Settling back, I nodded. "No, don't be. Short notice and all that. I'll just have to invite you over for dinner some other time, just the four of us." Foursix came back then, bearing a serving tray, the cake sliced neatly and placed on small plates for us. "Foursix, remind me to check our calendar and set up a dinner date with the Jotlipans."

Taking an unobtrusive place in one corner, Foursix answered promptly. "Yes, mistress Tolwyn."

"Thank you, that's terribly thoughtful of you." Hué dimpled at me then leaned forward to take a plate from the serving tray.

I accepted my own plate and, after a tentative nibble, took a healthy bite of the delicious cake. "Mmm, think of it as a down payment on more of your cooking. This is perfectly wonderful."

Hué and I talked for hours, mostly about life on Coruscant. My childhood in the lower levels contrasted sharply with my current status and even her comfortable middle class existence. And yet life was still life and many of the worries and concerns stay the same; safety, security, companionship. It was remarkably easy to talk to her, especially when compared with a soulless, muck-sucking creature like Mrs. Rhysode. I never felt like Hué was digging or prying, only that she was genuinely interested in anything I had to say. It was such a relief to have someone I could really talk to that I felt a physical pang when she glanced at her chrono and exclaimed at how late the hour had grown.

Seeing her to the door myself, I impulsively hugged Hué in farewell, startling an embarrassed smile out of her.

"Please, do come visit again," I spoke into her ear.

Her green eyes twinkled at me as she answered. "As long as it isn't an imposition."

"Not at all," I assured her. "And be sure to let me or Foursix know when you'll be free for an evening in the next few days. We really must have dinner together."

"Don't forget, we're only a few floors down, you could certainly drop by and see me some afternoon. I'll send over a copy of my schedule so you'll know when I'm home."

Hué gave my hand a final squeeze and dashed out the door. I was left standing there, staring at the wood-paneled durasteel as it slid back into place behind her. Visit her. It was a perfectly reasonable, perfectly logical, and perfectly wonderful idea. It would get me out of this house, out of these same rooms, for a while. It would be like a mini vacation. So why hadn't I thought of it? Why had the very idea of leaving the house by myself stunned me into momentary silence?

"Mmmm, getting out of here for an hour or so..." Saying it aloud there in the entry hall to test the sound of it, I decided I liked it very much. So why the shock and initial reluctance? Was I that unsure of my recovery, that subconsciously I wished to stay secreted away, effectively in hiding? Was there something that I couldn't remember out there that frightened me? Or was it as simple as the fact that I was so entrenched in my own life that stepping out to meet others instead of making them come to me was as foreign as a Togorian speaking high Alderaani?

The Force alone knew.

Still mulling that over in my mind, I went back to the living room for another slice of cake.

* * *

Dai sprang the concert on me late the next afternoon. Coming home from work early, he greeted me with a kiss.

"I was thinking that you must be getting a bit stir-crazy in here day after day, with only the garden for a change of scenery. I got us tickets for a private box at the Skydome tonight. I didn't exactly check the schedule until after I had the tickets." He looked both dubious and hopeful at the same time. "It's Trianii opera."

Twining my arms around his neck, I kissed him deeply and felt his lips pull into a smile under mine.

"Does that means you don't mind?"

"It'll be a learning experience, since I've never heard Trianii opera. But, no, I don't mind."

"Excellent. I've already told Thackary. If you'll run and get changed we'll leave as soon as you're ready. Hurry a smidge, though, if you could. I want to try and squeeze in a quick business meeting on our way to the Skydome."

"Not all women take hours to get ready," I reminded him with a jab of my finger. He rubbed at the spot on his shoulder while I winked at him. "Just the ones that don't have droids."

* * *

Evening was fast falling around us as we set out, Dai, myself, Thackary, and a driver in one speeder, and four more men following in a second. Surging out into the traffic with expert precision, our driver began the task of maneuvering our vehicle from point A to point B without being spread all over the windshield of speeder C. Around us the city blurred past, still spinning on at the same break-neck speed it always moved at. Commerce, industry and entertainment continued as the diurnal gave way to the nocturnal, but day and night made little difference to the frenetic pace of life on Coruscant.

We headed northeast, actually angling away from our destination, but Dai had mentioned a business meeting, so I didn't worry about it. Snuggling close to my husband, I watched out the tinted windows of the speeder at the sights around us, surpassingly glad that we weren't moving any faster. The buildings and slower freight haulers whipped past and were left behind in a distressingly short amount of time. After not wanting to be a criminal, the main reason I never stayed with the swoop gangs when I was younger was that I could not abide moving that much faster than my own two feet could carry me.

We continued on, and I suddenly realized we had crossed an invisible boundary into a different city sector. The buildings were naggingly familiar, then I remembered. We were flying through a corner of Angel territory. _Who could we possibly be meeting this far out? Are we going to be late? I don't want to miss any of the opera._ Drifting gradually into lower lanes and a light evening fog, we entered a more industrial section and finally came to a halt on the back corner of a warehouse roof, the view of us cut off from traffic by an advertising sign decrying the virtues of one brand of cargo droids over another.

There was someone there already, waiting for us.

It was impossible to mistake those grey jackets with the wide, deep red stripe down the length of the sleeves. Even before the speeder coasted to a smooth halt in view of the trio of swoops parked near the sign's supports, I knew who they were. Even before I could see the red chess knight symbol displayed proudly across the backs of those jackets, I knew who Dai was meeting. All three men had names stitched in black below the stylized equine profile, though in the light evening mist I could only make out one well enough to read before they turned to face us. It said Death. My own short flirtation with the danger and recklessness of swoopgangs stood me in good stead still, though years had passed since that time. We were meeting with representatives of the Horsemen. And not just any representatives, but the head man himself and two of his lieutenants.

My husband put his hand on the door release, but I spoke quickly, slipping an arm through his elbow to keep him close to me. "Dai, I don't like it. Why are we here? You shouldn't be dealing with people like this. Those men are terribly dangerous."

He paused to look back at me, a soft and strangely pleased smile gracing his face. Instead of reassuring, it only added to my anxieties for some reason. "Don't worry, darling. It's just a little meeting. It won't take long, and Thackary is very good at what he does."

Pressing a kiss to my forehead, Dai slid out of my grip and stepped from the speeder, Thackary with him. Two of the guards from the second speeder joined them as well. The three men waiting out there turned to face Dai, and immediately the tallest started shouting, making threatening motions with his hands. The canopy of the speeder muffled the words, made them indistinct, though the tone of them carried through quite well. The man was furious. His voice rose in volume with every emphatic gesture. A cadaverously thin fellow reached out a restraining hand to his companion, but the man shrugged it off violently then raked stiff fingers through his dark blond hair. He wasn't just angry, he was scared too, and taking pains to hide it. I didn't know how I knew that, but I did.

Dai held out a single hand, palm up, and lifted his shoulders in an 'are we ready yet' gesture. I couldn't see his expression, but that gesture was as familiar as my own face in the mirror. The thin man led his distraught companion a little away at the direction of the third. It was this third man who bore the name Death on his jacket. He radiated a powerful sort of intensity. He was focused on just one thing, though I had no means of knowing what that goal might have been.

Dai spoke softly to Death, and the grimfaced man only nodded in response. This was often the case. Dai was a skilled businessman, and those who went up against him frequently found themselves bowing to his will, no matter how reluctantly. The gangbanger listened carefully as Dai continued, a slight downward jerk of his chin marking off points in whatever instructions or offers Dai was making to him. From the manner of the three, I doubted it was an offer they were taking willingly, but everyone knew that gangs were no better than they had to be. Swoopgangs were often worse than common criminals. Thankfully my time with them had been short enough to preclude me from actual participation in any illegal activities.

Finally Dai stopped talking and spread his hands in his usual ending benediction. Business done, all sales final, no returns or refunds on merchandise. Death closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and as he let it out, nodded. He murmured something low to my husband and Dai nodded in return. With a jerk of his head, Dai motioned Thackary back towards the speeders. Thackary turned neatly on his heel and walked back to my speeder. Opening the door, he motioned that I should climb out.

"Mrs. Tolwyn, your husband would like you to join him outside."

"What's this about, Thackary?"

"A business deal ma'am. It's perfectly safe." My dubiousness must have shown on my face because he continued. "Your husband and I will never let anything happen to you."

I had no notion what bearing my appearance might have on a business deal, especially one which involved, of all people, gangbangers. I loved and trusted my husband, however so I did as I was bid. With a slight jerking nod I slid across the seat and stepped out of the speeder, careful of my dress. I didn't want to accidentally snag it on something and have it rip before we'd even gotten to the theater to see the opera. Thackary offered me a hand, and I smiled at him gratefully as he assisted me out of the vehicle. Then, my high heels clicking on the ceramacrete roof, I walked to my husband's side.

"Darling, is there something you need?"

"Just your presence, my love."

The man Dai had been negotiating with, or perhaps dictating to, gasped and I whipped around to look at him. Death was white as a sheet, though I could see an angry flush starting at the base of his throat. He hissed a single word through pinched lips, his eyes drilling into me.

"War."

My gaze was drawn to the motion as the tall man and the ambulatory skeleton beside him turned and glanced up from their private conversation to look at me as well. Both faces went blank for a fleeting moment before they seemed to understand what they were seeing. I found this frankly confusing, for it was only myself that made the scene different from the last time they had looked upon it.

"Chenowyth!"

The man, War, for I had barely glimpsed the word stitched on the back of his jacket, lunged forward, hands outstretched. His desperate expression barely registered, overwhelmed by the impact of his size and direction of movement, threateningly large and straight at me. A sudden panic welled up in my throat and I scuttled behind Dai, using his body as a shield, though he wasn't nearly large enough to stop someone that size.

He knew my name! A horseman knew my name, knew me by sight with no hesitation. Not possible. I'd ridden with the Angels barely a month, not nearly long enough for anyone outside the gang to even know I existed. It just wasn't possible. There was no way this could really be happening.

I half murmured something fearful and Dai turned to wrap his arms around me protectively, though neither of us should have bothered. Thackary and his men were prepared as always.

Blasters sprouted with admirable speed and pointed at the three men from several angles, hemming them in, the sound of the weapons snapping into position a clear warning. The other two Horsemen grabbed War, stopping his advance, half swinging him around with the momentum. Their eyes slanted between the blasters, me, and their distraught companion.

From behind the safety of my husband's warm embrace, I watched them. War was sobbing and raging by turns, though his words were too garbled for me to make out. His friends whispered urgently, pleading with him, though whatever agony gripped him remained undiminished. Finally Death placed a hand on the back of War's neck and forced him to look down into his face. Death spoke four small words, and though he spoke too low and was too far away for me to possibly hear, I knew what they were. I don't know what strange place the flash of insight came from, but as his lips moved I could trace each motion, actually seeing the words as he shaped them. How I knew, how I came by this amazing leap of logic and gut instinct, mystified me, but clear as a comm signal the emphatic words appeared in my mind.

"Think of your children."

Instead of abating, the agony on War's face redoubled. He rocked back, apparently torn, and against better reason my heart went out to the poor man. Whatever was happening he was obviously being forced to make a terrible decision, though what part _I_ played in the whole thing remained an enigma. With a shuddering sigh War pulled away from his companions, but he made no further move toward us, instead trudging away, though he continued to shoot miserable, longing glances back at me of all people. His troubled eyes, the hurt and bewildered eyes of a wounded animal, dwelt only on me.

The blasters Thackary and his two men held relaxed only a little, but they did relax as War put distance between us and Death returned, expression grimmer than before. Dai didn't wait for the man, instead speaking first, still holding me pressed close to his side, though I had no intention of straying so much as a handsbreadth from him.

"Well? I've held up my end of the bargain. You know what my requirements are."

"Yes. And of course we have no choice. The Horsemen will do as you demand, but if-"

"Yes, yes, please don't be tedious. Perform the task and you'll have what you want in return. It's just that simple."

Dai didn't wait to hear any more, but hurried me away to the speeder. I glanced back over my shoulder and caught an unguarded expression on the big man's face. He was just as angry as his friend, but by no means was it the searing, passionate flame that was driving War. No, this was a controlled anger that did not bode well for my husband. And then his expression shifted, ever so slightly, the grim frown edging over into a wolfish grimace.

_That man is really thinking now,_ I told myself. _Instead of just reacting, he's thinking, and thinking hard._

War was still staring at me, longing and rage in his gaze. I shivered in reaction as one of Thackary's men opened the speeder door for us. "He knew my name, Dai," I whispered low as we settled ourselves back in the speeders. Death, with his lieutenants lined up next to him now, stood still as stone and watched us leave. My eyes stayed on them until distance stole the menacing figures from sight. "How could he know my name?"

"Hush, darling." Dai pulled me close and pressed a kiss to my temple. "Even such people as the Horsemen can come across news flimsies. Besides, I approached them once before to do this job for me, but they refused. Now I have some leverage, and they have no choice, but I imagine that they did a little checking up on me. It wouldn't have been hard to find out."

"But what would be the point of pretending to know me? What could they possibly gain?"

"You are scared and rattled, darling, and that affects me in no small way." He fingered an ebon curl that had escaped my bound up coiffure, and nuzzled my neck. "No doubt they hoped to rattle me as well. But they won't get very far playing silly games like that."


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** Sorry for the long delay to anyone who was reading. Reality often interrupts my attempts to get a life.

* * *

Held close and secure in my husband's arms, I lay awake long into the night. The opera had been stimulating, in fact I had enjoyed it immensely after a bit of time spent acclimating my ear to the truly astonishing range of tones the Trianii vocal cords could produce, though the memory of that meeting lurked in the background, tainting my pleasure. Dai had grimaced, and then sat stiffly, trying not to listen, but exerting nearly as much energy trying to look like he wasn't trying not to listen. My bright smile, a promise of his reward for this timely gift, had pulled an answering grin from him. Taking my hand in his, he had squeezed it and then relaxed for the rest of the evening. That, however, wasn't what kept me from sleep, now.

Horsemen.

Of all the gangs Dai could have gotten involved with, why the Horsemen? My own gang, the Angels, had been bad enough, but the Horsemen themselves, let alone the stories I'd heard of things they'd done, were frightening. It was an entire gang of thugs and uncaught jail-birds. Kidnapping, extortion, racketeering, blackmail, piracy, grand theft. You name it, they've been there, done that, and bragged about it afterward. Rumors told around the breakfast table in Heaven claimed that there were even several females in the Horsemen, but I doubted that there were women heartless and evil enough to join such a group as the gangbangers who'd gotten away with the Kensing Massacre. The cops never did prove a thing on that one, though everyone knew exactly who had done it.

The Horsemen, harbingers of doom and destruction, everything they touched withered into corruption. And now, somehow, my husband was in business with them. It was a business he controlled, that they resented, so maybe it wasn't all bad, but I still didn't feel good about it. There were too many opportunities for disaster when dealing with people like that.

Going back over the scene, I thought about Death's reactions, about War's abject terror for ... someone else. The man bulked large enough that physical threats certainly shouldn't faze him in the least, so it made little sense that the panic and rage in his countenance had been for himself. Death had been angry, but not boiling over like War, simmering, patient and steady. Death was a very dangerous man in charge of a mob of animals. War was obviously chief among those animals. And yet I kept coming back to that outward projection of concern from War. Men like that didn't care about anyone but themselves, who else could he be worried about?

Children. Death had reminded War of his children. The words were seared in my brain, refusing to change or blur no matter how I shied away from them. Despite fog and gathering darkness, right through my own fear, Dai's concern, and the Horsemen's desperation, they'd been laser etched into my mind with nothing to dull or blunt the impact. I had not misread or misheard. _Think of your children._ Those were the words, and yet they made no sense. What woman would love a feral beast like that? And where would he get children to be so absolutely torn over?

_Torn between children and wife? It makes a kind of sense, but ... War of all people? And where is his wife that he is so panicked and angry and afraid?_ The next thought was the most perplexing of all, no matter how I looked at it. _Why was War staring at me?_

Restless, I shifted, snuggling closer to Dai's body, tucking my head under his chin and feeling the soft pressure of his breath against my scalp. The beat of his heart under my palm was steady and sure. Nothing made any sense anymore. The nightmares, my illness, this business with the gang, it was all starting to loom just a little too large for me. The whole world was turned upside down recently, but at least I still had my husband and his unswerving love to cling to.

With those as my anchor I could never be swept away by life's storms.

* * *

"And blast me if he didn't go and do it," the senator finished loudly.

I smiled as politely as I could, simulating emotion despite the fact that I was quite wrung, barely feeling anything other than fatigue by this point. "Well, senator, my husband is a very persuasive man. And if the quality of our food is any indication, our cook is not unhappy about his choice."

A twitter of laughter rippled around the small circle and Senator Denali covered his embarrassment as only a career politician could and added a loud guffaw of his own. With an effort I joined them, one hand nervously fingering the exquisite tiered necklace of corusca gems that Dai had presented me with before the party had begun. The matching earrings weighted my earlobes, winking and sparkling even in the subdued lighting that bathed the garden's grounds. Both served to draw attention away from my close-fit sheath of dark blue crepe–'to match my eyes' Dai had said–even if only momentarily. Female eyes lingered on the gems, while male gazes tended to settle a trifle lower. I felt enough of a curiosity as it was, everyone enquiring after my health, and despite their beauty I wished the jewelry simpler or plainer. I recognized the futility of that, though. If I had gone without adornment I still would have been the object of appraising stares simply because of who I was, Mrs. Eseladai Tolwyn.

Gesturing with my nearly empty wine glass by way of excuse, I drifted away from the group. I did not immediately move to another, there had already been far too many tonight, but let the light currents of socio-political maneuvering carry me along through my garden.

Everywhere it was the same. Witty repartee, savory canapes, sparkling wine glasses, and glittering partners of both sexes hanging on the arms of Coruscant's elite. They slid from group to group, face to face, false smile to faked emotion as dictated by their allegiances, their associates, and their ambitions.

And for me, at each circle were florid compliments and wide smiles that showed more teeth than warmth from people that I only knew from reputation, who had only just become aware that I even existed. At every stop there were stories, and I had none. There was discussion of current events and issues, but I did not know them. There were cronies, allies, and almost-friends, and I was alone.

Dai watched me like a hawkbat. Thackary and his men were unobtrusive, but I knew they were there. More than once my husband or my guardian had stepped in to pull me away when my control slipped and the panic showed in my eyes. Dai would stroke my arm and back, whisper gently in my ear until someone caught his eye and he was gone again. Thackary would hover, driving the guests away with his forbidding glower until I sent him away, though I couldn't be quite sure he wasn't just safeguarding the king's ransom hung about my neck. None of which changed anything, serving only to give me time to readjust my 'party face' and calm my anxieties once more.

Tired of the noise and chatter and bright lights, I moved with the currents of people sifting gently from power struggle to gossip session until I reached the edge of the party. Then I simply turned and took the first path I came to that lead away from the light and noise.

Amazing, how fast they disappeared. A few steps and the voices blurred into a background chatter. A few more and I had to pause to let my eyes adjust to the darkness that lay beyond the lights of the party. The grate of an expensive shoe on the flagstones and a low murmur registered as one of Thackary's men reporting my whereabouts, but he was well trained and let me go, standing guard at the head of the path where he could intercept anyone heading my way.

Enjoying the respite from the crowd, small as it really was in comparison to what had been described to me as the norm for this sort of gathering, I walked slowly along the path that wound around the outside of the garden. Feeling my muscles finally relax, I strolled between my garden and the night. Outside the world was as dark as it ever got, the sky devoid of natural illumination, but with every building and tower around lit up and glowing fit to outshine the moon. The lights of the flowing traffic below seemed to me nothing less than stars cut loose from their places to cavort like children around my ivory tower.

I breathed deeply, relaxing as I could not among the lords and ladies of Coruscant high society. Force, there were two ambassadors and at least half a dozen senators in my garden! Howlrunners were more at home on Hoth than I was in that gathering of socio-political elite._ I'm sorry, Dai. I can wear the mask, but it doesn't fit right and it chafes to wear it for long. I'm a simple girl thrust into a very complicated world._

A stray flicker of light caught my gaze, so I stopped and turned to look, curious. Not actual lights from a vehicle, but a reflection, it took a few moments for me to find it again. Something small with a reflective finish–no, several somethings. And they were moving toward the Lorrus Tower. Five or six swoopbikes disappeared beneath the horizon of the floor and I leaned forward, nearly pressing my nose to the transparisteel, to see if I could spot which level they were going to. _Maybe I should call building security and warn them of a break-in._ I reared back only seconds later as three of the swoops rose surreptitiously back into view and hovered outside my own window.

They were a few meters away, but I could see them clearly in the backlighting from the cityscape as I took another step back. Three men, who might have been clones they were so alike in shape, approached the floor to ceiling windows while the rest held back, out of view below the level of the floor. One doffed his helmet while another floated closer to the transparisteel on his repulsor field. This one pointed something at the window and there was a slight sizzle as the clear material began to glow and melt. Cutting a large circle from the window, the man darted away, letting the third man forward. Mounted on the back of his swoop was something that could only have been an engine lift put to unique use. As a tractor beam it was of limited utility, there was a fairly low weight restriction on it as well as a very short operating distance, but it proved more than sufficient to pull the circular pane of transparisteel from its hole.

Curiosity had long ago faded into frozen disbelief. This couldn't possibly be happening. Where was security? Where were Thackary and his men? Where were the alarms, flashing lights, and rushing burly men with blasters to stop this? Surely this must be stopped. We couldn't be robbed in the middle of a party. It would be a social disaster.

The first man moved in again, the second taking hold of his steering yoke, and leapt nimbly through the opening in the window. Rolling to bleed off momentum, he came up roughly against the thin trunk of an abdala. I winced at the damp crack of vegetative damage and barely managed to stifle a whimper of distress. They hadn't even taken anything yet and we were already out the cost of repairing the window and nursing the poor abdala back to health.

This couldn't be happening!

The man shook himself, pushing up off the ground. A fourth swoop rose into view, the man lifting his visor to growl through the gaping wound in my garden at his companion._ That's impossible. We're over sixty storeys up and the Caelli-Merced 43 has a flight ceiling of only a handspan over three meters!_ a startled portion of my mind objected, fixating on random details in an effort to deny what I was really seeing.

"Keep it down, we've only got seconds before-" My eyes rose from the swoop to the rider. I'd seen the man only yesterday and the memory was fresh and bright, his face was shadowed, but his voice was clear and unmistakable.

It was Death. The Horsemen had come to do some mischief in retaliation for the demands my husband had placed upon them. Dai should never have gotten involved with those people. I told him they were dangerous, that he shouldn't go and meet with them, and now look what had happened. _I hate it when I'm right. At least about the bad things._

I gasped in recognition, shocked to the core of my being to see swoopers, gangbangers, in my neighborhood, and my hand, clenched tight at my side inexplicably opened and beat a rapid tattoo on my leg. It was a smooth downward stroke, my lacquered nails rasping loudly on the fabric of my dress, followed by three quick beats. Whether my gasp or the slap of my hand against my thigh, I'll never know, but the sound caught their attention. Two heads jerked my way at the noise and Death broke off his hurried instructions, staring through the hole with narrowed eyes into the shadows of the pathway where I half hid. "It's her. Thank the Force. Grab her and let's go, Phyl. There's no time to waste."

The hulking man strode toward me, hand outstretched to me as if I was a friend. "C'mon, you can ride behind me. We gotta hurry." Trembling with fright, I backed away from him until I fetched up against something solid, by texture and scent it had to be a mandshuria. Whatever else he was, this man was no friend of mine, nor did I wish him to be anything other than far, far away. "C'mon, before security gets here. We don't want you to get hurt accidentally."

He took two more quick steps forward, expression confused but determined. A hand big as a nerf hock closed around my wrist and I was pulled gently but firmly toward the hole in the window. The physical contact broke the paralysis that had gripped my vocal cords–or perhaps it was my brain that had been frozen–and I screamed for all I was worth. Digging in my heels, I tried to fight the forward motion, but it was like fighting with a cargo hauler droid and just as futile.

"Dai!"

"Shut her up," Death snarled over the hum of repulsors, frustration and impatience flooding his tone.

"Thackary!" I only got out the two calls after my scream before Phyl's second hand clamped over my mouth, effectively silencing me.

"Sorry about this, but it's for your own good. Death says so." This last was delivered with the blind faith of a trusting nerf following the herd-leader over a cliff. The sincerity of it was baffling, but didn't alter the situation a single whit for me.

Changing tactics, I stopped trying to resist him and instead lifted one foot high before raking it downward with all the force I could muster. The long thin heel on my shoe made a reasonable facsimile of a weapon, leaving a ragged and bloody gouge down my assailant's shin, ripping the leathers he wore to tatters. I was suddenly fantastically happy that the heels were reinforced for longer durability. His hand left my mouth to clutch at the wound, but he kept hold of my wrist, dragging me, with an awkward, jolting limp, ever closer to the hole and the swoops waiting just outside.

"Let me go! Kriffing pigeon, let go of me!" I howled, scratching at his fingers with my nails, seeking any advantage I could get. We were even with the hole now and Death leaned sideways in his seat toward us, hand outstretched to take me. They were going to steal me out of my home and no one was going to stop them. The Force alone knew what they had in mind once I was away from my protectors, my husband. I couldn't go. I wouldn't go.

"Let me go!"

A second stab with my heel finally gave me the opening I needed, a pained grunt and just enough slack in his fingers to slip from his grasp. I staggered backward and landed hard on my bottom, still shouting my fool head off for help as I scuttled ever farther from the threat, oblivious to the sound of tearing cloth or what the rough edges of the flagstones were doing to my palms. Behind me there was a thrashing in the greenery and pounding feet on the path. My heart leapt with unutterable relief when four armed men materialized around me, weapons already coming to bear on the Horsemen. My would-be kidnapper turned without hesitation and dove through the hole, where his compatriots had maneuvered his swoopbike into position.

The whole mess of them jetted away even as someone skidded to a stop behind me and wrapped strong, warm arms around me, and Thackary himself leaned half out the window to fire after the fleeing gangbangers. I was already hiccuping with sobs when he pulled back, frustration and anger blazing out from him in palpable waves. Dai just pulled me closer, heedless of what the combination of my tears and makeup were going to do to his suit.

"How did they get in here?" Dai hissed through gritted teeth, his tone savage.

"The alarm was bypassed," Thackary spat. "It didn't last long, but it didn't have to. It was certainly long enough to get them in close. I'll see that it can't happen again."

"It shouldn't have happened once. They almost got Chenowyth."

Over the pounding of Dai's heart and Thackary's muttered oaths I could hear our guests approaching down the paths, the babble of curious and alarmed voices. Moaning, I buried my face deeper into my husband's shoulder.

"Please, I can't face them like this, Dai."

"Shhh. I know. Thackary, keep them away from here. Better yet, send them home. My wife interrupted a burglary attempt and is understandably distraught."

"Franks, Nyet, stay with the Tolwyns, everyone else with me."

The silent men in dark suits filtered away again, as quickly as they had come, leaving me with my husband, our two stalwart guards, and the memory of danger in the dark.


	4. Chapter 4

"And you didn't recognize any of the men?"

I sighed and repeated myself yet again to the Coruscant Security detective. "No, I didn't recognize any of them. They were gangbangers. I don't socialize with people like that on a regular basis."

"I thought you didn't recognize any of them. How do you know they were in a gang? Were they wearing any insignia, anything that would identify a specific gang?"

I hid a grimace by closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. Arguing would not get this over with any faster, in my experience quite the contrary in fact. With a weary shake of my head, I elaborated. "No, but they were big, dirty men in dark clothing on swoops. What else would they be?"

My interrogator didn't answer in words, but his expression plainly indicated that he could think of all sorts of possibilities, with a swoopgang being fairly low in the rankings. His stylus scratched across the face of his datapad and I cast a forlorn look around what had been a sanctuary for me.

My garden had been invaded. All the lights were up to full intensity, blazing brighter than the noon sun, casting the whole area in a stark, clinical light. Everywhere there were police. Holocams recorded with cold efficiency the gaping hole in my window, the damage to my tree, the scuff marks on the flagstones, the ragged tears in my dress, and the scrapes on my palms. A droid floated around the 'scene' as they called it, plucking bits of this and that from the ground and storing it away in little compartments. In its own tedious way the whole investigation was more intrusive than the break-in itself. At least that began and ended in mere moments, barely more than a minute of my life. This investigation only dragged on and on.

"And the one with his helmet off, what did he look like?"

"I already told the other man-"

The disgustingly calm and sober looking policeman interrupted me gently, but firmly with a slightly raised hand. "If you'd just tell me one more time, please."

"Big. He was big and wide."

"How big?"

I stretched a hand up, but there was no way my slender arm was going to convey the impact of that hulking figure pulling me through the shadows. "About there."

"And how wide?"

"About so."

The detective nodded, making a note on his datapad. "Go on."

"He, uh, had fair skin and lightish hair, cut real short."

"Do you remember anything else about him?"

"Other than being terrifying, no. Please." I brought my hands up to my face, remembered my remaining makeup, and settled for wrapping my arms around myself. "I'm tired. I've told this to at least three different people now."

"Yes, Detective ... Ellison, was it?" Dai interjected, coming up behind me. He draped his coat over my shoulders and pulled me close. "My wife has been scared out of her wits and subjected to a very personal assault. I'd like to get her cleaned up and into bed. If you have any more questions you can ask them tomorrow, after she's had a chance to sleep and calm her mind."

"Just one more question, Mr. Tolwyn. Can you think of any reason why these people tried to kidnap your wife?"

Dai glared elitist daggers as he replied, cold disdain dripping from his every word. "I'm a very wealthy man, Detective, and I love my wife very much. Apparently that was more than sufficient reason for them to attempt such a thing. That they failed is something I am deeply thankful for. That they nearly succeeded has me outraged beyond belief. If that is all, I wish to get my wife away from all this."

"Of course. We're nearly finished with the scene. As soon as we're done I'll inform your man, Mr. Malos, and you can see about fixing that window and getting your security restored. I'll comm ahead if I need to ask either of you any more questions."

I managed a timorous smile, but didn't move so much as a centimeter farther from my husband. "Thank you."

Dai escorted me to the lift, pausing only briefly to whisper to Thackary, no doubt alerting him that the police would soon be out of his way. We rode up in silence and Foursix met us with the tea service and a sedative. I walked where directed, guided by the gentle pressure of my husband's hand on my back, glad beyond words for the absolute quiet of my home. I had thought myself wrung like a dishrag at the party, and I may well have been, but now I felt worse, if that was possible. Now things slid past me without touching me, as if I were numb, only I wasn't. Numb doesn't make your hands shake. Numb doesn't make your voice quiver. Numb doesn't flay you alive and leave you exposed before the elements, to feel each exquisite agony as 'helpful' people tried to patch you up and put you back together.

Numb would have been a blessed relief. I made an effort to push it all away, finally settling for overwhelmed, overloaded, and exhausted.

Only when we were alone in the bedroom did I speak again, sitting at my dressing table, my hands folded in my lap to hide their trembling, perhaps to prevent them acting on their own again. I'd actually slapped my hand against my leg loud enough for those swoopers to hear. The idiocy of it was appalling, but the fact of it remained. Why, why had I done such a thing? The confusion of fear? A nervous reaction to anxiety? A combination thereof? I didn't have the strength to sort it out.

"Dai, why did I just lie to those policemen?"

"Because we needed to, darling." Expensive porcelain clinked as he poured the tea.

"But don't we _want_ the police to catch them?" I accepted the delicate cup with one hand and the chill cylinder of the hypospray with the other. Staring down at them I sighed. "I just don't understand."

Dai moved away to the closet, loosening his collar and heeling out of his shoes. "Once this business I have with them is over with I'll feed those vapor-sucking velocity blinkers to the cops in neat bite-sized pieces, but until then we need them. Having the cops sniffing too closely too soon would be more hindrance than help."

"It was Death, the top man himself." The hypo was set for someone much larger than I was, so I absently thumbed the knob down to a more reasonable setting before pressing the business end to my neck and chasing it with a swallow of warm tea. "I heard his voice, plain as day. It was the Horsemen. I know you think we need them, Dai, but I've got a bad feeling about this. We're going to regret having anything to do with them before this is all over."

Dai knelt beside me, looking at me through the mirror. "I've got it all under control, love." Was it just the long night of stress, or did he actually sound smug? "Drink your tea and get some sleep. You'll feel better in the morning."

Perhaps I would, but in the morning the Horsemen would still be out there and the police still wouldn't know that they were the ones who had done this to me. And tomorrow I would still know I was in danger.

* * *

Dawn broke, spilled across the city, died, and passed well into late morning before I finally dragged my sorry self out of bed. Dai's side was empty, as usual, even though it was the weekend. Foursix wasn't around, and I didn't bother to summon her, in a mood to do for myself, for a while anyway. I shrugged into a dressing robe and slippers, standing at the window only long enough to glance at the sky and give my scalp a good scrub with my fingertips.

My home had been invaded, not once, but twice last night, my life endangered, my every movement questioned and examined. The world moved on, regardless. I was much closer to numb now than I had been when the sedative took effect and pulled me down in to dreamless–thank the Force!–sleep. All the fear and worry had finally pushed me past the edge, to where any more was just more, and couldn't possibly make things any worse. It was like free-falling, peaceful and liberating, but not destined to last long. Sometime soon I would hit bottom and everything would catch back up with me. For now, however, I was calm and strong. I was coping.

Turning away from the view, I padded down the hall toward the more public rooms and the kitchen. Surely our cook wouldn't mind a little unscheduled snack. My stomach rumbled agreement with my thoughts and I smiled, probably the first sincere smile I'd enjoyed since the party began last night.

My husband's voice, coming from his office caught my ear. His words caused me to pause outside his door out of sight of the occupants.

"It's all cleaned up downstairs?"

It was Thackary who responded. "The window's fixed, the loophole in the system closed. What about ..."

"Chenowyth will sleep until well after noon with the dose I gave her last night. You can relax about that."

I straightened, now wide awake. The hypo settings hadn't been a mistake, or left over from the last usage, but a deliberate act. Why? I wasn't so delicate that I needed to be insulated that way. There was certainly no need for me to spend the whole day asleep.

"I assume you commed Siwash." Thackary's question jolted my thoughts back to the conversation I was no longer feeling the least guilty about eavesdropping on. Again, there had been no need to consult with the healer who had treated me. I was fine, all signs of illness gone. Sure, I had occasional nightmares, but so did perfectly healthy people, so that was no real indicator. I knew Dai was protective and a bit paranoid, not unreasonably so considering how terrible things had been before I got better, but to comm the doctor after something that boiled down to merely a bad fright struck me as a little overboard.

"It seemed like a prudent thing to do, under the circumstances," Dai replied, his tone dry. I wanted to peek through the doorway to see their expressions, but didn't dare now. Then I might have to admit that I'd overheard the drugging comment and I was a little too angry with my husband just then to be civil about it.

"What's that quack saying about the nightmares?"

"That it's normal and should fade."

"And the conditioning?"

"He said the changes would continue to hold, but we should avoid stressing her any more."

"Ha! Tell that to the Horsemen."

"Hmmm. Yes. We need to do something about them, Thackary. Something to discourage any further foolishness of this nature."

"You wouldn't like my first suggestion on that matter, since it hasn't changed since we snatched her. Sending them her finger would get the message across loud and clear, but you just let me know what you want me to do once you've decided."

They were silent for a moment before Thackary spoke again. "I still don't understand, Es. Too many people have seen her. You can't possibly give her back now."

"I don't intend to give her back, now or ever."

"That's dangerous. Those gangbangers aren't going to take that well. They may even attack us again, more openly this time."

"I've got that worked out already, Thack. Another attack would add the perfect finishing touches. A few words in the ears of the right people will put a stop to the civil disruption caused by these gangs and other criminal elements."

"The senator?"

"For one. It will all work out, Thack. Just wait and see."

Rumbling stomach or not, I slipped back the way I had come as quietly as I possibly could and crawled back into bed, sick with horror. Laying there I stared up at the ceiling and trembled. I knew Thackary was efficient at his work, an old hand at the business, but I had never though him capable of that sort of ruthlessness, that level of barbarism, no matter who it might be directed at. I thought furiously. My own husband had intended to drug me far more heavily that he should have, dark plans for the people Dai was protecting and threatening all at once, and last but not least, lurking at the edges of my thoughts, the word 'conditioning'.

I was terribly confused.

His tone clearly indicated that he didn't agree with the way things were being handled, and Thackary hadn't said therapy. He hadn't said treatment. The word was conditioning, and that brought with it all sorts of connotations that had little to do with valid medical practice. What it in fact brought to mind was words and phrases like 'to break in' and 'to train'. To 'adjust'.

All this in turn made me wonder, just what about me had my husband 'adjusted' while I was being treated by Healer Siwash.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:** I'll keep the chapters coming. Please read and review.

* * *

It came in flashes, the dream, nightmare really. White and gold, scarlet and grey, green and orange, blue and white, a kaleidoscope of colors all blurring together before coming into a sort of focus. Fragmentary moments filled with images of violence and faces both familiar and strange. A tall woman in white and gold, with a menacing man beside her. Velocity I identified easily, she was the leader of the Angels and a friend, of sorts. The man scared me, though I did not know his face, and his eyes blazed with anger aimed at me. Danger was close at hand, I knew it, felt it to the depth of my being. I was in terrible danger, and enemies loomed all around me. A crate of blasters and a jumble of Angel faces that I flirted with, though I couldn't put names to them. Weapons suddenly sprouted everywhere and someone tackled me from behind. Streaks of blaster fire, searing scarlet death ripped through the air around me. A Wookiee towered over me, scooping me up over my protests. And finally, Death, blaster in hand, taking aim at Angels in Heaven's spacious garage.

I thrashed in the bedsheets, aware that I was dreaming, but unable to wake. The images settled, becoming a coherent scene, and changed from Heaven to hell, from pristine and white to dingy and dark, but not the darkness of night.

Buildings towered so high above in these places that sunlight only reached the ground during a few minutes at local noon. I walked, smiling, talking animatedly with someone I couldn't quite see, someone I was holding hands with, familiar enough with that I didn't need to turn and look at them to know they were listening to what I was saying.

A flash of light, dizziness rolled over me like a wave. Confusion, weakness, pain blossomed dully in my knees as I slipped toward the ferrocrete walk. I rolled over and stared up at the small square of blue sky far, so very far above, framed by the buildings around me. Concern, I felt desperate concern for ... for who? The person I was holding hands with? I didn't know, couldn't remember, but I struggled to rise so I could check.

Hands grabbed me, pulled me roughly away even as others clutched at my battered leather jacket, trying to hold me back. I didn't want to go. I struggled against the hands. No, I had to stay and check on ... must check. I was lifted up, away from the clutching hands and a face swam into view. It was the face of the man lifting me from the ground, his strong hands gripping my shoulders.

Thackary, it was Thackary.

I tried to relax, knowing that the nightmare must be over, that I was rescued and fear could, should end, but my dream self didn't stop struggling, weakly, ineffectually, but fighting all the same. It was as if I didn't recognize him, but that was absurd. Thackary had been my husband's security chief for many, many years, coming to Lyra every other week or so to make sure the security there was not slacking off.

Darkness wiped away the last of the dream and I wrested myself from sleep with a cry of distress, an unknown name hovering behind my lips. I stifled it, not wanting to draw attention and knowing that someone might hear. Dai would want to know what it was about, and I could not lie to him. It was just a nightmare, no doubt brought on by the kidnapping attempt, or at least the second nightmare was.

The first had the feeling of memory, but I could not match it to any event during my brief time with the Angels. A firefight, inside Heaven. It couldn't be a memory, there was no way I'd have forgotten something like that happening. But then what? Why would I dream of Horsemen and other gangs fighting in Heaven's halls?

The second was much easier to figure out. Clearly it was supposed to be a kidnapping, the exact circumstances changed as my subconscious mind tried to deal with my tangled emotions about that event. But why did Thackary's arrival not comfort me and banish the fear? That couldn't be right. Who was I worried about, whose name had I been about to call out? Dai hadn't been in any danger and there was no one else in my life who could wring my heart that way. My parents were dead and I had no other family members left that I knew of. There weren't even any children for me to rear and protect.

Baffled, unsettled, I lay back and closed my eyes again, but was careful not to fall back into sleep. I had far too much to think about to waste time sleeping now.

* * *

I was laying on my side in bed, the covers pulled up, half way between thinking and dozing, when Dai came in some time after noon. I'd deliberately turned away from the bedside chrono so that the agonizingly slow passage of time wouldn't drive me completely insane. My stomach had long since ceased complaining, and I had analyzed my dreams until I couldn't stand the confusion they brought me one second longer, so my thoughts had drifted to memories of my illness, few though they were.

One scene came more vividly than the others. A vibroblade was clenched in my hand, Dai standing before me. The feelings of rage and determination burned still, and I was ashamed of them. Vile words of the most astonishing hatefulness spilled past my lips and I lashed out with the knife, missing by a bare hair's breadth, slashing his fine tunic and shirt, but leaving the skin beneath untouched, thank the Force. Dai dodged away as I slashed again, this time thrusting forward, aiming for his heart. Suddenly the knife was gone–had it been Thackary?–and Dai was wrapping his arms around me. I slapped, I screamed, I clawed at his face, raw rage tunneling my vision. The memory of his voice whispered in my ear and I could almost feel his breath against my skin.

"It's going to be all right, darling. It's going to be all right. Don't worry, I'll take care of you."

The memory made me shiver. How could my mind have snapped so completely that way?

Dai's hand on my shoulder, a gentle shake, more of a rub really, pulled me away from the unpleasant past. I stirred slowly, remembering that I was supposed to be drugged, and lifted blinking eyes to the man who had loved me enough to stay with me, despite all that I had done, who had seen to it that I was healed. I smiled with no need for pretending, my anger forgotten. He had his reasons, even for drugging me.

"How are you doing?" he asked softly.

"Mmmm. Better now," I said with all honesty. Better than he could possibly know. I scooted closer and burrowed into his willing embrace, snuggling close. "You said you'd take care of things, and I should know better than to question that."

"That's okay, darling. You'd had a terrible scare, you were understandably distraught. Besides, you told the police exactly what I asked. You were very convincing. Don't think about it anymore. I told you I'm here for you."

I looked up into his eyes and then pressed a kiss to his lips. "Mmm. And I'm terribly grateful that you are, love." He gave me a squeeze and something flashed in those blue eyes of his, something dark and possessive and pleased. I would have said that was perfectly normal for a man holding his nearly naked wife in his arms, but something about it struck me as off kilter. I couldn't say what.

Pushing that disturbing thought away, I settled against him and laid my head on his shoulder. Other thoughts, nearly as distressing, tried to intrude however. That word 'conditioning' kept nagging at me and I couldn't keep the question from popping out.

"Darling?"

"Hmm?"

"We were ... okay before, weren't we? I mean before I got sick." I felt him tense up immediately, all the muscles in his slim body pulling tight, so I rushed on to explain. "I know that was a very bad time for us, but before that we were happy, right?"

Dai relaxed a little, stroking my hair and I listened to the low words of his answer with my eyes closed. "Of course we were. Chenowyth, I love you. Your illness did not change that. Now, what brought this on, more nightmares?"

I nodded, though it wasn't strictly the truth. My nightmares were disturbing enough, but few of them had anything to do with Dai at all, which seemed a little strange, but they were just nightmares after all. It constantly amazed me, the crazy stuff an idle brain could come up with in the dark of the night to scare itself.

"Oh," I said, remembering something I had meant to tell my husband last night, before ... events got out of hand. "Watch out in any dealings you have with Kire Rengstorf."

"Ah? Why is that?"

"The man's a liar, worse than that, he's a braggart."

Dai chuckled, the sound rumbling through his chest and bobbing his shoulders. "And how do you know that?"

"You should have seen him in action last night. I heard him tell no less than four different versions of the same story to four different people," I explained. "Each one cast him in a better light than I'm guessing the real story would have, each tailored to the people he was talking to. I have to give him credit for a sort of slimy intellect for that part, but he strikes me as a person we should do well to avoid in matters of business."

"Hmmm. I'll keep that in mind, darling. But if he's so clever, why did he tell the same story four different ways with you listening in?"

"Oh, I wasn't in the group with him each time. I heard him tell it behind me while I was talking to Beshay Inst'ran. The second time I was standing in a group with him. After that I kept an eye on him and listened carefully whenever he was near enough to do so."

I didn't mention that several times I'd only inferred his words from the way his lips moved. Ever since that episode with the Horsemen on the rooftop I'd become aware that I didn't necessarily have to hear someone to know what they were saying. It bothered me a little that I couldn't sort out just how I'd come by this strange skill, but it felt quite natural, so I didn't dwell on it too much. However, I wasn't ready to tell my husband about it just yet.

"Very astute of you, Chenowyth. See?" He pressed a kiss to the top of my head. "I told you that you'd do wonders for me here instead of staying back on Lyra. Mr. Rengstorf has actually approached me about joining him in a business venture, and I was thinking very seriously about agreeing. But now, with this news, I shall look into it much more closely. Thank you, darling."

"My pleasure, love."

I was quite content to sit there pressed against him, basking in his love and warmth, but shortly the door opened and Foursix entered, carrying a tray. The smell wafting from it awoke an indelicate sound from my empty and protesting stomach. Dai's chuckle vibrated through his chest to mine.

"Hungry, love?"

"Mmm, very much so." I nodded and sat up, adjusting the pillows so I could lean against the headboard.

Dai pulled the blankets up over me and moved out of the way so that Foursix could set the tray in my lap. "I shouldn't wonder, as you've slept half the day away."

I ate slowly, not thinking about much, exchanging smiles with my husband who had produced a datapad with the day's news on it from somewhere and was mostly busy reading. The day outside the window was bright and beautiful and it lifted my spirits even higher.

On a sudden whim, I jabbed the button on the nightstand to summon Foursix. When the droid arrived, I offered it my try. "Foursix, did Hué send a copy of her schedule?"

"Yes, mistress Tolwyn."

"Is she currently at home?"

"The schedule I have for her is currently open and should remain so for the rest of the day, mistress."

I hopped off the bed and headed for the closet, shedding my robe as I went. Dai looked up from his datapad to watch me.

"What's this about, darling?"

"That visitor I had the other day, Hué Jotlipan? I'm sure I told you about her. She suggested that I come down and visit her if I had free time. I thought now would be a great time."

Dai frowned, the muscles in his face all drawing into lines of disapproval. "Are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, those vicious swoopers tried to take you away only last night."

I drew a thick sweater over my head and smiled at him as I pushed my hair out of my face. "I need to get out of here, Dai. Some simple girl talk is just what the doctor ordered. And it's not like they could possibly know where she lives or that I was there. Nor is it likely that they would try again so soon." I slipped into a pair of slacks and strode back to the bed to press a kiss to my husband's forehead.

"Besides, if you're so worried, you can always have Thackary or one of his men walk me down there and stand outside the door."

"They didn't use the door last time," Dai reminded me as he snagged my hand and pulled me closer. "I don't want to give them another chance, Chenowyth."

"I'm not going to let you invade Hué's home just to make yourself feel better." A flash of genuine anger flared in his eyes, and I reminded myself that my husband was not a man used to being balked. "I'll be perfectly fine, darling. I just need to get away from the testosterone fest for a little while. I love you dearly, and Thackary's not bad to have around, but I feel terribly outnumbered once in a while."

I slipped my hand out of his, shoved my feet back into my slippers, and gave him a parting smile and a blown kiss as I stepped through the door.

* * *

I repeated the conversation with Thackary, but managed to get away from the apartment with only two hulking men in dark suits flanking me. Hué met me at the door with a smile and an impulsive hug.

"I heard about last night. It's all over the building. Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine. You're not busy, are you?"

"No, come in, please."

It took a long hard glare to convince my watchdogs that I did indeed want them to remain outside in the hallway. My hostess tactfully ignored the exchange and led me into a more comfortable, if less posh, sitting room than I had entertained her in.

Settling in opposite each other across a glass and wrought iron caf table, Hué raked me with a searching glance and waved a hand in the direction of the front door. "I can guess why they're here."

I heaved a deep sigh. "Then can you guess why I demanded that they stay out there?"

"Tired of being watched constantly?"

I nodded. "You have _no_ idea. It's great to feel safe, but..."

"Too much is smothering."

"Smothering, that's a good word for it." I slipped my feet from my slippers and tucked my legs up under me. "And it doesn't help that there's not a single female there but me."

Hué laughed, and I heard true understanding in the clear tones. "Believe me, I know. Between my husband and my boys it can be a mad house around here." She smiled at me warmly, an expression of genuine appreciation that relaxed me as little else could. Her expression shifted slightly toward annoyance and she reached beneath herself to pull out a blue Connect-us piece which she absently deposited on the table next to a small collection of its fellows. "That's why I'm very glad you came to visit. I certainly don't get much girl-time myself."

I glanced around the room, taking in the homey touches that my own lacked. A handmade something sat proudly on a scuffed end table, a child's school project no doubt. The heel of a small shoe peeked out from under the dust ruffle of an upholstered chair and a forgotten datapad had somehow wound up perched on top of a light fixture near the hallway into the rest of the apartment. And there was the Connect-us collection on the table. Those little touches all gave the place personality. It was clean, but there was a feeling of ...life. Yes, that was it, it felt lived in. The apartment I shared with Dai seemed artificial in comparison, cold and impersonal. It felt like a museum, arranged just so, and look all you like, but please don't touch anything.

Rubbing my hand absently over the softly worn fabric of the couch, I caught Hué scanning me, worry in her eyes. I smiled at her, shaking my head. "I can tell you are just dying to hear what really happened last night. I'll tell you, if you'll tell me more about your work. I am desperately in need of a dose of normality right now."

"I'm not sure you could call anything I do at work normal."

I laughed. "It's got to be more normal than swoopers interrupting your dinner party for a quick abduction."

"Okay, but you go first so we can get the scary stuff out of the way."

I nodded and took a deep breath. Where to start? Talking of the party would bore her to death, if I hadn't been so twisted by anxiety the Force knows I'd have been bored to tears. But I couldn't just jump to the man jumping through my window, it gave no context, no framework for understanding.

Hué must have sensed my indecision, or perhaps she sensed my discomfort. "Would you like a cookie?"

Brightening, I smiled. "I'd love one."

"Good." She stood up from the couch and invited me to join her with a wave of her hand. "Come into the kitchen and we can talk while I make some."

* * *

Hué got the same version I told the cops. She got a little more detail, though: expressions, body language, odd things that had caught my eye, the strange thoughts that try and intrude when the mind faces more than it can cope with, the tiny little things that suddenly become blindingly obvious and overwhelm the senses until something else jumps out at you.

"I don't know, it's kind of like this whole illness of mine has given me a new way to look at the galaxy. I mean everything seems so sharp and clear. I can find meaning and emotion in every word and gesture. And–mmm, these are very good–then there's this lip reading ability that I've suddenly acquired. It's kind of disconcerting."

We were in Hué's doughnut shaped kitchen, surrounded by counters and cabinets. The island counter that occupied the center of the room sat atop yet more cabinets. The room was brightly lit, warm, cozy, and currently filled with the scent of freshly baked cookies.

Hué pushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear with the back of her hand, smearing something white and powdery across her cheek, then pulled the second pan of cookies from the oven, turning the appliance off after setting the pan down. "Suddenly acquired? That doesn't sound right. I mean, you're Lorrdian aren't you? I thought that was as natural to you as reading a flimsy or anything else."

"I-uh..." I broke off the denial almost before I'd begun. It was true. I knew it was, felt it was, even as she said it. I'd been doing it for as long as I could remember, except for the last few years. Strange. So how had I forgotten it then? How had that skill, one learned almost from birth, slipped my grasp for even a moment? That's what I had been doing at that rooftop meeting with the Horsemen. That was what I had been doing when Kire Rengstorf told his carefully edited story at the party. _I've been doing this my whole life and I suddenly just ... forget? That can't be right._

"You know, you're right. How could I have forgotten a thing like that?" I mused finally. "But how do you know that?"

"Oh, I have a young Lorrdian girl that I work with. She's a precocious thing. She reads lips better than print right now, the little darling. She's got problems with even her gross motor control and her parents are terribly concerned."

"I can see how they would be." I shuddered at the thought of not being able to control my body, not being able to speak my native language. It would be bad enough for any human to have that problem, but for a Lorrdian it would be much worse. It was like having a severe speech impediment on top of everything else.

"Yes, but she's making great progress. Something else I learned from her is a very general grasp of Lorrdian body language. Something else is bothering you. What is it?"

"That obvious, huh?"

"Not to anyone who hasn't been taught to watch your shoulders and the tilt of your head."

I chuckled ruefully. It had been far too long since I'd been around my own people, but Hué was doing a pretty good job of making up for it. "It's just some nebulous worries. A nagging sort of anxiety. Maybe just talking about it will help."

Hué nodded and slid the last cookie onto the cooling rack. "Talking often helps, if only to get you to say it out loud and really think about it. Talking is almost as good as a warm spice cake." She wiped her hands off on a small towel and settled onto a step-stool, waiting for me to continue, so I organized my thoughts as quickly as I could.

"What comes to mind when you hear the word 'conditioning'?"

"Training, mostly physical, but sometimes mental. Physical conditioning or therapy is used to build up muscle to correct or prevent injury. I assume you're going somewhere with this?"

"I overheard Thackary use that word in connection with my treatment. It bothered me a little is all." I was silent for a moment, thinking hard, and Hué waited patiently. I leaned forward onto my elbows and traced the pattern in the island's tile counter top with a finger."When you're working with a patient, how do you ... train them out of say a bad habit?"

"Well, there's two methods to that. You can reward a better behavior, or punish the bad."

"Which is preferable?"

"Depends on the child, though most often rewarding works better in the long run."

"Why?"

"Well, rewarding gradually replaces an undesirable behavior with a better one, while punishing creates an aversion to the undesirable behavior. If the patient is rebellious there could be problems, since they tend to do the forbidden just to get attention. Also, a tolerance can be built to whatever is used to trigger the aversion."

I nodded slowly. It made a lot of sense. But I didn't feel particularly rebellious. Of course, I didn't feel like someone who needed 'conditioning' either. I took a deep breath, unsure, but needing to ask anyway. "And how could you recognize that someone had been given this punishment type therapy? Do you recognize any signs of it ... in me?"

Hué was off the stool as if she'd been ejected, flashing across the distance between us before I could blink. She pulled me upright away from the counter, her hands running gently but firmly over my head and then down my shoulders and arms, but her eyes were riveted to my face. "He doesn't hit you, does he? Your skin's dark enough to hide bruises, but..."

"No, no, it's nothing like that," I assured her quickly, shaking my head and urging her to relax, which she did, but she didn't return to her spot across the room, staying beside me and holding my hands in her own. "It's just a feeling really. I- I can't justifiably call it more than that."

Eyes wide, Hué patted my hand. "I'm not the right kind of therapist for this, but I do wish I could help you."

I shook my head. "I'm sure it's nothing, Hué. I was just thinking out loud. It's most likely just jitters left over from last night."

Hué stared into my eyes for a few moments longer, her concern for me lapping outward in palpable waves. "All right." She relaxed with a sigh, but I could see her mind spinning behind her eyes. "Have another cookie, then, and tell me what life on Lyra is like. I've never been off Coruscant and I just love hearing about other planets."

* * *

I had moved from leaning against the counter in Hué's kitchen to sitting on it, watching her clean up after her baking efforts, when the invasion came. Three boys spilled into the room, no doubt drawn by the heavenly aroma issuing from the oven, chattering away at high speed and volume. That there was no need to lift their voices except to be heard over each other obviously never occurred to them in their enthusiasm.

"Mom, there's two thugs lurking in the hallway!"

"They're not thugs, mom. They're obviously undercover Rep Sec. We had to show them our building passes just to come in." The correction was accompanied by an elbow jab to the ribs, which was returned in kind with no sign of actual malice, just the casual violence of small children. And I wanted one of these? Well actually, yes, I did. More than one, preferably.

The third boy, youngest of the three, showed the most awareness of his surroundings. While his brothers fired off still more speculation at Hué, his eyes latched on me after glancing at the cooling rack beside the stove.

"Can I have a cookie, mom? Who is she?"

"Not until after dinner, and this is Mrs. Tolwyn from upstairs. Those men in the hall are her security guards."

Rather than silencing the boys, this announcement engendered a thousand more questions, all directed at me this time.

"Did you really beat up a whole gang of swoopers by yourself?"

"Did the swoopers really come to make you their queen?"

"Was it scary?"

"Did you shoot them with a blaster?"

"Can I ride on a swoop?"

I laughed out loud at their energy and enthusiasm. Yes, I definitely wanted more than one, they were perfectly delightful.

"No, no, yes, no, and that's entirely up to your parents once you get a little older," I answered, ruffling the sandy hair of the youngest boy. They were pressing forward, more questions already beginning to spill from their lips when Hué cut across them neatly, without even raising her voice. It was an enviable skill.

"Now it is time for you boys to go clean up. Your father will be home soon and we'll have dinner then. I want clean boys and a school work report before then. Scoot."

With much artificial groaning the boys trooped out the opposite door they entered and left a shocked and empty sort of quiet behind them. It was very much as if they had stretched out the small room while they were there and it was echoingly empty now that they were gone. Hué blew an exasperated sigh and waved in the direction they had gone.

"Those are my boys. And you do get used to the noise eventually."

"No, they're wonderful," I assured her. "Dai and I just haven't ever managed to find ... the right time to have our own. I do envy you. They seem so..."

"Exhausting," Hué supplied for me. "I understand they grow out of that about the time they're old enough to marry off."

"Yes, but their energy and enthusiasm for life are infectious."

"As are all the germs they bring home from school and friends." Hué shook her head. "I'll be very glad when that stops finally. I really can't afford to get sick every time one of their classmates does."

Uncomfortable with the talk of illness, I slid off the counter, slowly, regretfully. It had been a wonderful few hours, but I didn't want to impose when there were obviously things Hué needed to do.

"Thank you very much for having me," I said. "It's been so nice getting away from the men for a while. I swear, Dai and Thackary are paranoid about letting me out of their sight for even an instant."

Something flashed in Hué's eyes as I said that, but it disappeared quickly. "Please, come by again. I enjoyed it just as much, I assure you. And you are certainly welcome down here anytime."

Hué saw me to the door where my bodyguards were only too happy to see me again, safe and sound. She gave me another of her warm hugs in parting and then the door closed on that welcoming, lovely home. I sighed.

The differences between our lives were glaring, monumental, staggering even. And yet we were both women, both loved our families, and both craved the feminine companionship that our daily lives lacked. Stepping back into my world of men, men, and more men, I couldn't have been more grateful that I had Hué for a friend.

* * *

"Oh Dai, you should have seen them. They were so full of energy. They just filled the whole room up and all I could do was smile and smile. They were so darling." I glanced up from where I sat brushing out my hair over to where my husband was undressing for bed.

"Mmm."

"Three of them, all in a row, shooting out questions like construction droids spitting out rivets. They see the world so clearly, and yet they view it with such innocence."

"Well, they're children."

"I think it's time we had one, darling."

"What?" His blue eyes were wide, startled, as I knew they would be. He'd been distracted by something most of the evening, answering absently without paying much attention.

"Isn't it time we started our family, Dai? We're quite comfortably well off, and I don't work, so I'll be able to devote all my time to caring for our child. I don't even care if it's a boy or a girl." I rose from the vanity and walked to where he stood, wrapping my arms around him and laying my head against his chest. "I want to have your child, darling. I think we've waited more than long enough."

"Chenowyth, we've talked about this..."

"I know, but if we keep waiting for the time to be right we'll never stop waiting and then it will be too late. Don't you want a son to give your name to? Don't you want a daughter to spoil who will bring home boyfriends for you to intimidate?" I looked up at him. "We could name our son Darien."

"Darien?"

"It was my father's name."

"I knew I shouldn't have let you go down to visit that Jotlipan woman."

"Oh, it's not Hué's fault. I've wanted children for years now. She just showed me what it is that we could have if only we stopped this silly waiting."

"It's not silly, Chenowyth. I have my reasons."

I pushed away from him, peeved by his stern tone. "What could they possibly be? It's not like we can't afford the healer's bills. It's not like we can't pay for schooling and the rest. It's not like we don't have the time to devote to them."

Dai frowned at me. "No. This is not the time. Maybe in a year or so..."

"Hmm. Well, that's better than saying never."

He reached out and took my hand, pulling me close again. "Good, now that's settled..."

He leaned down to kiss me, but I pulled back, still a little angry that he was being so stubborn about the whole children issue. "Think again, mister."

Dai's frown came back, the crease between his brows deeper, but he relaxed again, tugging at my hand and reaching out to caress my face. "We ought to keep in practice, darling. That way when we finally decide to have children we'll know we're doing it right."

"Ha! Nice try, but that's not going to help you tonight." I stepped back again, trying to slip my hand out of his grasp. Dai jerked me roughly toward him, his grip on my wrist tightening painfully. "Ow! Dai, you're hurting me."

At my words the anger melted out of his eyes and his hands were suddenly gentle again. He released me at once. "I'm so sorry, love. It's just been a bad day at work today. Things aren't going as swiftly as I need them to. A project of mine is rapidly approaching the deadline and there are some stiff penalties on this one if we fail to finish on time."

I nodded and let him hug me, stroking at my hair. There was still tension in his body, his muscles quivering beneath my hands, but his touch was light and his voice soft as he murmured words of love in my ear. It was going to be fine, I told myself as I pushed down the spurt of fear his roughness had prompted. He had too much on his mind right now, was all. I shouldn't have pestered him about having children, desperately as I wanted them. It would all come in time. For now we had each other, and that was enough.

Dai kissed me tenderly and then climbed into bed. He lay on his side, back to me, and said nothing more. Left standing there alone, I bit at my lip, unsure. Then, I turned out the lights and slid into bed beside him, feeling suddenly quite alone.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: I appreciate all the readers I seem to be getting. Can I ask for a little review or two?

* * *

Maybe it was all the sleep I'd gotten the day before, or maybe my internal clock functioned better than could possibly have been suspected. Whatever the reason I found myself blinking awake before more than a thin line at the horizon had been lightened by the approaching dawn.

Dai still slept, sprawled on his back, and I lay watching him in the changing light from the windows. Smiling, I brushed a hand across his chest in the lightest of caresses, entranced with the pleasure of seeing my husband in the growing morning light. As my fingers skimmed over his flesh for a single confusing moment the skin beneath my dusky touch was a highly contrasting pale pink, lacking the proper olive tones, and the muscles were harder, more defined, the shoulders broader. I jerked my hand back as if stung, startled by what I saw, but it was just Dai, as he had always been, lean and dark and compact.

Alarmed, I pressed the back of my hand to my mouth, stifling the cry of fear and distress that hovered in my chest, tears welling at the corners of my eyes. I blinked against the tears and froze to still the instinctive rocking motion that might have awakened my husband. Something was terribly wrong with me. There really wasn't any other explanation for all of this. These dreams, hallucinations, these ... visions, for lack of a better word, were starting to come more frequently. What if the treatment was failing? What if I was going to relapse? But I didn't feel crazy. Off balance, yes; confused, often; crazy, no.

I wasn't screaming. I wasn't hysterical. I wasn't violent. I wasn't any of the things that had been serious symptoms before. And yet I saw another man in my bed, sleeping next to me. I saw a bedroom in an industrial building of some sort. I dreamed of kidnappings on the city streets and gang wars in places that had never known such violence. There just had to be something wrong with my mind and the very possibility scared me witless.

That's how all this had started the last time: paranoia, hallucinations. Things had gotten terribly bad before they got better. Sweet Force, I'd even tried to kill Dai! I thanked the Force that I couldn't remember more than tiny fragments of it, but surely Dai remembered with shocking and terrible clarity. The pain it all must have caused him I could only barely begin to imagine. There was no way in all the Sith Hells that I wanted to put him through that again, that _I_[/i] wanted to go through that again.

I could ignore the hallucinations. I could wave away the dreams and nightmares. I could understand the memory lapses and blank spots. I could fight against the paranoia. All of this I could do, and go on as if everything were normal. But there were those words that had lodged in my brain and refused to leave. Words that thrummed like badly tuned repulsor coils and cut through my thoughts like lightsabers. Words that told a story that _might_ be different from the one I'd been told.

'Conditioning'. No. Dai loved me and would never hurt me.

'Training'. No. I was imagining things, starting at shadows and scaring myself with monsters in the closet.

'Changes'. _No!_ What changes? Dai loved me. Dai would never hurt me. Dai only wanted me to be safe. I was making towers out of kiosks. There was no strange plot, no conspiracy against me. I was just being silly. It was the leftovers of fear from the swooper attack, or it was the fringes of the treatment, a few lingering pockets of not-quite-right that I hadn't managed to drain away yet. It was nothing. It was fog and fear with no more substance than either.

It _had_ to be, for my own sanity and for the sake of my husband and my marriage.

_But what about the drug dosage? And the deal he's got with the gangbangers?_ an insidious whisper asked in the back of my brain. _How did they just happen to come to where you were that night at the party? What about the over protectiveness? What about the anger when you stood up to Dai yesterday about going to Hué's, and last night about the children?_

No! Dai was my husband, and he loved me just as I was. Why would he want to change me? I was just being silly, paranoid. My imagination was working overtime and running away with me. Lingering anxiety was making me focus on things that weren't important, that meant less than nothing. Dai loved me!

Needing the reassurance, I rose up and leaned over to kiss Dai. I continued with a nibble on his ear and he stirred, wrapping his arms around me. Another kiss brought his eyes fluttering open. No words were spoken, none were needed as he began to return my urgent caresses.

Of course he hadn't changed me. That was ridiculous. Why would he? There was no possible need for it. I didn't argue with him, didn't spend too much money, didn't sleep around behind his back, didn't plague him with unfounded suspicions when he came home late. Wasn't I the perfect wife?

As my husband woke fully and turned to me with pleasure in his blue eyes, the nasty little whisper got in one last shot before sinking back into the dark depths of my mind from which it had risen.

_You are now_.

* * *

I lay in bed long after Dai had gone to work. Just having him there, hearing the sound of his heart beating in his chest as I relaxed in his arms had calmed me, quieting that vicious little voice in my head. My fears were understandable, but in the end that was all they were: fears.

I had been attacked, a kidnapping attempt made against me. The Force only knew what those swoopers had planned to do once they had me. I supposed that it was probably to ransom me back for whoever Dai was holding to make them cooperate. Struck by the sudden thought, I rolled over onto my stomach and propped my chin in my hands.

I hadn't come to the conclusion consciously, but thinking back I could not dispute it. Thackary had mentioned snatching someone, a woman. He had, in fact, recommended shipping a finger back to the Horsemen to get their undivided attention. I shook my head at such foolishness. Thackary Malos did not know who he was dealing with. Death would never stop if one of his people was hurt like that. Why, when Sloan was snatched...

The memory stopped sharply, as if cut. Confused, I groped for more of it, but it didn't come. Sloan, Sloan ... I knew that name. Right, I'd gone to school with him, shared some classes. Relieved that I had remembered, I folded my arms and rested my chin on my crossed wrists. Nice kid, but he joined a swoop gang and that was always been a dangerous proposition. Someone had grabbed him off the street. The Horsemen had moved swiftly and in force to bring him back. Wasn't that how the rumors had gone? It was rumors, right?

Regardless, Death was a dangerous man. He was loyal to his people and they would walk through fire for him. Thackary was going to find himself on the wrong end of a Horseman's blaster if he didn't watch out. And Dai, too. Their bodies would disappear into the Horsemen's Highway, never to be found, if they weren't careful.

I blinked, staring unseeing out the window. The Horsemen's Highway, the series of now unused mass transit tunnels that ran for miles under the surface of the planet. There was an entrance to them from Armageddon itself. How did I know that? Come to think of it, how did I know where Armageddon was? I'd never been to the place, never been given directions. There was no reason why I should, and no one would have told me. I wracked my brain for a clue, but none came, so I dismissed it. It was only more rumors and table talk at Heaven, no doubt.

That business with the Horsemen still worried me more than a little. What could my husband possibly be up to that he needed to resort to kidnapping and possibly extortion to accomplish it? He was playing a dodgy game and Death would not just forgive and forget, even if the woman was returned happier and healthier than she left.

Dai had never talked much about business with me. I just hadn't the head for it.

Sighing, I rolled over again. Things were happening around me, important things, things that would affect my life and the people I loved, and I could not see them clearly. Dai would never tell me what was going on, he was too busy 'protecting' me. Thackary was even less likely to confide in me, since that was not his job. My husband's life outside of our home was a complete mystery to me, I suddenly realized. I knew what Xanthus Corp did. I knew Dai's position within the management hierarchy. I even knew the current price for their stock. I knew the layout of the entire building, but I couldn't recall the color scheme for the executive offices. That was quite strange.

I sat up, frowning.

Well, the doctor had warned us that my recent memory would be impaired, that I might never recover it. There were quite a few things that escaped my memory, and this was just one more. Doubtless there would be others I would find.

I reached out and hit the summons button. Almost immediately Foursix entered the room.

"Run me a bubble bath. Lay out the dusty rose suit and then get me a datapad with today's news on it."

"Yes, mistress."

Rising, I strode to the window and stared out at the city spread before me. I kept telling Dai that I was well, that I didn't need to be coddled and watched over. Perhaps it was time that I started acting like it and did something useful rather than sitting around all day looking decorative and vulnerable and dwelling on all the little gaps in my mind. That meant doing a little research and seeing what I could find out about the markets and the competition.

However, that in turn meant using the computer.

I chewed at my lower lip in consternation. I didn't like the computer. I didn't feel comfortable around it. To be honest I was afraid of it, and of accidentally destroying it. Shaking myself, I strode away from the window. I'd been Dai's personal secretary and assistant for over a year. Surely I could handle a simple data search.

* * *

"A call for you, mistress."

Startled, I blinked and paused in the middle of getting dressed, pulling my attention away from the datapad sitting on my vanity table. For as long as I had been back on Coruscant, and granted that had not been all that long, I had never received a call, not even from Dai. Anyone I needed to talk to I called. Anyone who needed to talk to me ... no one needed to talk to me. Or maybe I was just used to having Foursix or security intercept most of my calls and weed out ... everything?

That just didn't seem right. Perhaps it was because I just didn't know anybody yet. Yes, that was the explanation, plain and simple. With the dinner party only just over, and ending in such a dramatic manner many people might have hesitated to call before this. Yes, that was reasonable. I'd just never had a caller before today because no one knew me well enough to bother.

Either way, a call was waiting for me now, so I rose to take it. To my surprise the face on the screen was Hué's.

"Chenowyth."

"Hué, what can I do for you?" I couldn't keep the smile from my lips, even if I'd wanted to.

The woman seemed, well, she seemed nervous. I'm too small and too nice to be intimidating, especially over the comm, but then my husband was a very rich and powerful man so maybe that was it.

"If you're not busy I have a new recipe I'm trying and I'd like an unbiased opinion."

I thought longingly of the work I had planned to do. I needed to get a start on it if I was ever going to prove to Dai that I was fully recovered. Then I thought of her cake and cookies. The work could wait a few hours, or even another day. It wasn't like Dai was going to go anywhere.

"I'm very much free, but I was there only yesterday. I don't want to wear out my welcome."

"If I wasn't sure I wouldn't be inviting you. Please, adult company is always appreciated by mothers of young children."

Laughing and nodding I remembered her boisterous sons and waved away any further entreaties. "So I'm beginning to understand. I'll be right down."

When I arrived with retinue in tow Hué hurried me in, throwing a suspicious look at the men settling themselves on either side of her doorway. That surprised me, because she knew exactly why they were there. She hustled me right through her livingroom and into her kitchen. There I got a second surprise.

Hué had another visitor.

A spurt of jealousy jolted through me. That I was being a little childish and selfish by bristling visibly at someone else in my friend's house occurred to me quickly, but I couldn't help it. She was my _only_ friend and I wasn't quite ready to acknowledge that she might have friends other than me. Neither Hué nor her guest missed my reaction, as I'd made no effort to hide it.

"I'm sorry for ... for not telling you, Chenowyth, but, well ... I was worried for you."

"I don't understand."

Hué was not wringing her hands, but only because she talked about uncomfortable things with many, many people in the course of her work and had long ago learned to control her reactions. "Those things you said yesterday, they got me thinking. I knew I couldn't help you, but I thought maybe someone else could. This is a colleague of mine, Sylkavan'Zant. She's a mind healer."

"Hué!" The feeling of betrayal was fierce and hot. Behind it came a strange sense of being trapped, of being hunted. I needed to leave, I had to escape. I pulled away from Hué and stepped back toward the door.

"She's doing this as a favor to me. I can't help you, but maybe she can."

"I don't need help. It's just nerves. I'm just being silly. My husband loves me. He would never do anything to hurt me. Hué, I can't believe you did this."

The mind healer watched the whole thing with a clinical, but empathetic expression. The dichotomy caught my attention, allowing me a chance to stop and think rather than just react. Something wasn't right here. I couldn't put my finger on it, but something was wildly out of kilter. Wrapping my arms around myself I took another step back, feeling better with a little more distance between me and the near-human woman.

"Anything you tell me will stay right here," Sylkavan said, watching me closely, analyzing my reactions almost as closely as I might have, though I'm sure with a different set of criteria than I would ever use. "You can certainly chose to tell me nothing, that is your right. I am here to help you, not judge you.

"Now, Hué tells me you feel you might have been subjected to some sort of aversion therapy during your illness. That you might have been subjected to some kind of mental conditioning."

"No, I'm just confused about a few things. I was ... I-"

I started shaking, the fear rising up and drenching me with a cold sweat. I stepped back again, bumping up against the wall. This wasn't right, she was just a woman. She was bigger than I was, but there was nothing physically threatening about her. I had two hulking men only a shout away who would happily break the door in and rush to my rescue. Why was I in a panic?

Hué reached out a hand to me, concern written plainly across her kind face. I opened my mouth to speak, to ask Sylkavan'Zant to leave, to excuse myself, anything, but my throat closed on the words and nothing came out. This was worse than my fear of high speed had ever thought of being. This was ... it was fear for my very self.

_But I know who I am, why should talking with a stranger threaten me this way?_ There was no logic to it, nothing that would explain this.

"Hmm. Maybe we should try this another way."

The green skinned woman turned and exited the kitchen. As soon as she was gone my trembling ceased and the strange dread subsided. I shook myself, unsure, confused.

"Hué, I- I'm sorry, I was rude, but... I don't understand it. I couldn't breathe I was so scared."

"I've never seen anyone look like that before." Hué moved slowly to my side, watching me for further signs of distress. "You went so pale I thought you might faint."

"I don't think I've ever been so scared in my life," I replied, "not even when those swoopers tried to kidnap me."

"Are you all right now?"

Slowly I nodded. "I think so. It was so strange, so sudden."

The mind healer chose that moment to reenter the kitchen. She smiled brightly and extended her hand to me as though seeing me for the very first time. "Hi, I'm Sylkavan'Zant, call me Sylk. I'm a friend of Hué's from work."

I gave her a timorous smile in return, but managed to extend a hand to shake hers without quivering like a pennon in the wind. "Chenowyth Tolwyn. I live upstairs. Hué invited me down to try out a new recipe of hers."

"Hué's told me a lot about you. I hear you had a bad scare the other night."

"Yes, but the police are looking into it. I'm sure they'll catch the people responsible soon. Not that my husband is taking any chances. There are two binary load lifters dressed in suits standing outside the front door."

"My husband can be like that sometimes. He's worse after any news report with a mugging or other sorts of street crime in it. I'm certain that one day he's just going to lock our door and not let me out any more."

The farce continued with Hué pulling out her cooking supplies and Sylk and I chatting lightly about inconsequentials. I perched myself back up on the counter, out of the way of Hué's preparations as we all talked about the men in our lives and how they drove us crazy. Talk moved quite naturally from there to families. Both of the other women had children and there were stories a plenty to tell of the strange and fascinating things they did for no apparent reason. But there was no sickening fear. There was no recurrence of the shaking dread, nor did my throat clog with choking panic.

"So, Hué tells me you were ill before you came to Coruscant."

It was slipped in so casually that I answered absently, my brain on automatic.

"Back to Coruscant, really. My parents came here when I was young. I left after marrying Dai and this is the first time I've been back since then." It took a moment to realize that I hadn't actually answered the question and I was still pondering over that when the next one came.

"What did you have?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"You just met me, that's understandable. But you're recovering, right?"

"Oh yes, I'm fine."

"Some sort of rim world fever or something?"

"I don't want to talk about it." The words tumbled out of my mouth in the exact same way as before, shooting straight past my conscious mind and through my lips before I had time to think about it.

Hué was watching out of the corner of her eye while mixing something new into a bowl of sticky looking gloop. She would add a bit and stir, add a bit and stir, usually at the same time. The specialized muscle tone and coordination that kind of effort must require baffled me. Either the woman truly loved cooking, or truly loved her family, to spend over ten minutes stirring one ingredient into something that would only be devoured as soon as the children got home from school.

Sylk eyed me carefully as she spoke. "Yes, you already said that. Very well. Instead why don't you tell me what you did today."

I took a deep breath to pause and organize my thoughts. This was a much easier topic to deal with. "I woke up a little earlier than usual, so I could see Dai before he went off to work. It was much nicer than waking up and finding him long gone like usual. After that I indulged in a rather decadent bath, complete with bubbles, and-"

"Your illness?"

"I don't want to talk about it." The words were past my lips before what she'd said had actually registered, cutting across my narrative as it had. I snapped my mouth shut, staring at the woman in consternation and surprise.

"That's one way to tell," Sylk murmured softly. She reached out and gave my hands a squeeze. "That's a conditioned response if I'm any judge. It overrides just about anything else and isn't consciously controlled. This makes me even more suspicious than your earlier reaction to me. Tell me as best you can, and I'll try to avoid tripping that particular trigger."

* * *

"The doctor said that my short-term memory would probably be lost entirely but that I should be perfectly fine." I was staring out Hué's kitchen window. I couldn't look at anyone while I talked about it. It was too hard to get the words out. I could talk to myself about it, though, and if someone else happened to overhear, well that wasn't my fault, now was it?

"Mental breaks of this sort are not unheard of." I didn't turn around. I didn't want to see the skepticism on her face, not when I could hear it plainly in her voice. "But usually there are signs of it for years. There are warning signals and more minor out-lashings before the dam breaks entirely. It's possible, but I find myself ... dubious. You should have been under the care of a ... nanny afterward, not a medical doctor."

"But the treatment has worked." I wasn't talking to her. I was only talking to my reflection in the window, thinking out loud. "I'm not violent anymore. I'm not trying to ..."

"Of course you're not trying to..."

I wasn't answering a question. Sylk was agreeing with me. It plainly wasn't a question, but I had to wait a moment before I could push the words out. "Kill Dai."

"Hmm. So, you were ... ill, you were treated, apparently cured, and now you are deathly afraid of talking to ... nannies." She'd learned quickly not to even say the word. My reaction was always sudden and strong.

"Is it possible that my husband took advantage of the opportunity to alter a facet or two of my personality that he found less than satisfactory?"

"I honestly don't know. The things we've uncovered so far don't make a whole lot of sense. If he had made you more agreeable, or more docile, or even more amorous I would understand it, but making you afraid of nannies is quite strange."

"I don't think he's done any of those other things, but the fact of the matter is would I even know if he had? Would I remember?"

I risked turning back to the room. Hué's fallen cake sat in a misshapen lump on a cooling rack. My friend had been largely silent, only speaking to reassure or calm me, and had gone about making her experiment around us. At one point Sylk had said the wrong thing and I'd leapt off the counter and bolted for the door. Hué had brought me back, caught me before I reached the door and my waiting guards. But her cake had fallen as a result. My apologies had been waved away with assurances that her children and husband would be more than happy to eat it anyway.

"Perhaps we should check the extent of what he has done, test the boundaries and see if we can find anything else that might be false," Hué suggested.

Sylk nodded. "An excellent idea. He seems to like the aversion option. So, what do you feel an aversion to?"

Blinking, I wrestled with my own mind over that. "Moving at high speed, complete darkness, nannies, computers–but how do you tell what's real and what's been ... adjusted? Any of those and more could be perfectly reasonable."

"We just have to be methodical and backtrack the reason for each aversion. You said computers. That's a little strange for someone who was a personal executive secretary, don't you think? That would require a bit more than a passing familiarity with computers. At the least you should be thoroughly comfortable with them in any environment."

I shook my head, waving the objection away. "No, I just ... I. I don't even like looking at them. That's so very bizarre. They make me terribly uncomfortable." Looking up I gaped at Sylkavan'Zant. "Computers don't normally explode just because you've turned one on. I know this quite well, but I have this terrible fear that one might do just that at any moment."

Sylk nodded.

Hué looked from one to the other of us. "It's not much, but I have a small computer unit here. Perhaps we should see what we can do to test this aversion. I haven't got anything important on it, so even if you do blow it up, there's no harm done."

I glanced at her, my gratitude showing clearly. This woman had risked a great deal for me already today, and showed no signs of stopping. "Thank you."

Her office was small and quite crowded once all three of us were inside and the door was closed. Gingerly I slid into the chair in front of the computer station and stared at it for a moment. Hué waited only a heartbeat before leaning down and turning it on. She threw a smile at me and then stepped back so that Sylk could stand at my shoulder. I stared from cpu to monitor to keyboard.

"If cpu's don't explode, does that mean keyboards don't bite?"

"Bite?"

I sighed. "That's what I was afraid of."

Slowly, tentatively, I eased my hands forward until I made physical contact with the keyboard. Wincing and turning my head, I waited. Nothing happened. Opening and closing my undamaged hands, I gave myself a little shake. It was just a machine, just a tool. I could do this.

"Now what?" I asked.

"Let's start small. A simple first level data search."

"About what?"

"Don't think about it. Just close your eyes, put your hands on the keyboard and start typing."

I took a deep breath and then did as Sylk suggested. I closed my eyes, blotting out the sight of the computer squatting there, a ticking bomb waiting to go off. Not looking at them helped immensely. As soon as my fingers touched softly on the keyboard they settled lightly and found the place markers and without conscious thought they sped across the keys tapping out commands. Startled, I glanced at the screen and my fingers faltered.

Sylk was leaning forward, watching the data scroll past. The public history of Xanthus Corp waited patiently for perusal. My gaze skipped across the paragraphs, seeing just enough to recognize what I already knew.

"Can you do a second level search?"

I chewed at the corner of my lip, but closed my eyes again and let my fingers free to do what they wished. They knew better than I right now what they could and couldn't do. And again my hands moved of their own will, and again the commands flashed out over the holonet, and again the data flowed back to us. Financial statements, their records of last year's earnings, current low-level employee listings, and more lay before me when I opened my eyes again.

"Can you do more, Chenowyth? By your speed alone I would say that either you were the very epitome of efficiency as a personal secretary, or you know a whole lot more about computers than I do."

"Of course I could do more. I could get you the personal financial files for all the board members, but Hué's system is too slow. This thing's not just obsolete, it's antiquated. No offense, I'm sure it works fine if all you use it for is storing your recipes, but Hué, this machine is too old to let me do more than browse the public levels of the 'net."

There was a startled silence and I turned to look at the two women, as amazed as they were at my words.

"Chenowyth, if I didn't know better, I'd say you were a slicer." Sylk's expression was equal parts intrigue and professional pleasure. She'd helped me break through at least one of the artificial walls in my mind and she was no doubt curious about what might lie behind the others.

"That can't be right. Why would her husband want to cover that up? Unless he was worried about her getting caught and getting them both in trouble?"

"Figuring out his motives is not my primary goal at the moment. We're making good progress here. Try something else, Chenowyth. Let's see what you can do. Close your eyes, I know you can't remember any of this right now, so it's going to have to be subconscious. Relax, let your fingers lie on the keys, and go someplace familiar, someplace important."

I listened to Sylk's words and tried to let my mind go blank. My fingers knew what they were doing, so I would trust them once again. Maybe with a little effort I could push the rest of the way through and actually reclaim these skills on a conscious level. After a moment my fingers began to move, slowly at first, then picking up speed. I didn't try to control it, or try to think about it, I just let it happen.

In the darkness behind my eyelids I heard Hué say, "What's that she's doing?"

"She appears to be remote accessing someone else's computer system."

"Is that legal?"

"If she has permission."

"Is she breaking in or logging in?"

"Can't tell yet. It could be a bit of both, I suppose. The little I know is from overhearing the techs when they come to do maintenance on my machine. Skill-wise she lost me back at the second level search."

My fingers dashed off a last series of key strokes and came off the board with a flourish. "Ta-da!" And I opened my eyes to see what I had done. I stared in shock, which quickly gave way to horror. Horsemen's Highway Map, one folder proclaimed. I shook my head in denial, but it didn't change. Another was labeled Armageddon Environmental Controls. With just a few keystrokes I could turn off their airscrubbers and circulators, filling the warehouse with dangerous levels of exhaust and carbon dioxide. I had sliced my way into the Horsemen's main computer system.

"Chenowyth-" Hué began.

"I see it, I see it."

"What does it mean?"

"I'm not sure, but it goes a long way toward explaining why they're mad at me."

"What if they catch us?"

"I'll clean up as I leave, they won't trace it back here. But I'm not going to do anything more on this computer. I don't want you to get in trouble because of me." _Out, I have to get out,_ I thought, and closed my eyes again, willing my fingers to act. After a long tense moment they responded, and pulled us out of the gang's computers, hopefully before anyone noticed we were there.

When it was done I heaved a deep sigh.

"Now what?"

Sylk smiled. "Now? Now you come over here and put your hand on the computer case."

"Why?"

"Because you don't want to. Because you are afraid of it. Because you need to see that it will not explode if you do so."

Gingerly, slowly, I reached out my hand and laid it lightly on the top of the old, boxy computer. Sylk, fast as lightning, slapped her hand down on top of mine with a resounding thunk. I tried to jerk my hand back, but I couldn't.

"See? No harm to it."

I nodded, heart in my throat. My pulse was still racing madly when she released me and let me pull my hand away from the computer. We gazed at each other in silence for a moment before Sylk drew a small datapad from a belt pouch.

"Now we've made excellent progress today, but I have another appointment scheduled soon and I really must leave in the next few minutes or I'm going to be late. When would you like to meet with me again?"

I blinked.

"Again?"

The green skinned woman laughed lightly. "Surely you didn't think we could fix everything in a single day." She consulted the datapad. "I have an opening tomorrow afternoon. We could meet here again."

I shook my head. "No. That would be three days in a row. I-I have to work this through a little. I need a bit of time. I think we should wait a day or two. Tolwyn is already getting upset about me coming down here."

"Tolwyn?"

I looked up from my thoughts. "Excuse me?"

"You called your husband Tolwyn, not Dai, this last time. Why?"

Shaking my head I grimaced. "I don't know."

Sylk smiled. "Trust your instincts."

"Which ones?" Hué gave my shoulder a squeeze while Sylk consulted her datapad again.

"The next opening in my schedule isn't for nearly a week."

"That's okay. That would be fine." I nodded. Yes, time to think this through, time to consider the implications, time to come to terms with just how much my husband was hiding from me about myself.

"Here then?"

"No, I think Dai would become irritated with me if I started spending all my time down here. Like I said, he's already a little miffed about it. I gushed about Hué's boys last night and he nearly burst a vein." I ignored the look they shared about that. Dai might lose his temper once in a while but he would never hurt me. "Let's meet in town, for lunch. Do you know a place with booths, preferably with privacy screens?"

"Yes, absolutely. I'll meet you at Max's, on Sariantog and Chambelli. On the twelfth at noon."

"The twelfth, noon, Max's." I smiled as she jotted some notation into the datapad. I would put it on my calendar as soon as I got home. I'd add some note about it being with Vrenna or some other society maven so that Dai would have no reservations about me going.

Standing up from the chair, I shook Sylk's hand. "Thank you, very much. Send Hué your bill and I'll see that it gets paid. In cash, I think."

"Worried about your husband finding out?"

"After he went to all the trouble of making me scared to death of ... nannies?" I finally finished when I couldn't force the word out. "Yes."


End file.
